:}imw^im

life.

/-^

PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

PREFACE

EiGHT-AND-TWENTY of these tales appeared originally in
the Civil and Military Gazette, I am indebted to the
kindness of the Proprietors of that paper for permission to
reprint them. The remaining tales arc more or less new.

RUDYARD KiPLINO.

^

16

h

CONTENTS

fAGS
LiSPETH 3-^

Three and — ^an Extra 10

y Thrown Away 15 "

/'Miss Youghal's Sais 26

'Yoked with an Unbeliever' 34

.^False Dawn 46^

The Rescue of Pluffles 51

^^upid's Arrows 58

Haunted Subalterns 64

The Three Musketeers 71

His Chance in Life . 79

Watches of the Night 86

The Other Man . 93

Consequences 98^^

The Conversion of Aurelian McGoggin . . 105

The Taking of Lungtungpen 112

Bitters Neat 119

A Germ-Destroyer 126

Kidnapped 133

The Arrest of Lieutenant Golightly. . . 140

In the House of Suddhoo 147

/ His Wedded Wife 157

The Broken-Link Handicap 164

Beyond the Pale 171

In Error 179

iz

z CONTENTS

PAGB

A Bank Fraud 185

Tods' Amendment 194

The Daughter of the Regiment .... 202

In the Prdde of his Youth 210

Pig 218

The Rout of the White Hussars .... 229

The Bronckhorst Divorce-Case 240

Venus Annodomini 247

The Bisara of Pooree . .253

A Friend's Friend 260

The Gate of the Hundred Sorrows . . . 267

The Madness of Private Ortheris. . . . 275

The Story of Muhammad Dm 285

On the Strength of a Likeness 290 "

Wressley of the Foreign Office .... 297

By Word of Mouth 304

To be Filed for Reference 310

RUDYARD KIPLING

A BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH

By Charles Eliot Norton

The deep and widespread interest which the writ-
ings of Mr. Rudyard Kipling have excited has naturally
led to curiosity concerning their author and to a desire
to know the conditions of his Ufe. Much has been writ-
ten about him which has had Uttle or no foundation in
truth. It seems then worth while, in order to prevent
false or mistaken reports from being accepted as trust-
worthy, and in order to provide for the public such
information concerning Mr. Kipling as it has a right
to possess, that a correct and authoritative statement
of the chief events in his life should be given to it. This
is the object of the following brief narrative.

Rudyard Kipling was bom at Bombay on the 30th of
December, 1865. His mother, Alice, daughter of the
Rev. G. B. Macdonald, a Wesleyan preacher, eminent
in that denomination, and his father, John Lockwood
Kipling, the son also of a Wesleyan preacher, were both
of Yorkshire birth. They had been married in London
early in the year, and they named their firstborn child
after the pretty lake in Staffordshire on the borders of
which their acquaintance had begim. Mr. Lockwood

zi

xii A BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH

Kipling, after leaving school, had served his apprentice-
ship in one of the famous Staffordshire potteries at
Burslem, had afterward worked in the studio of the
sculptor, Mr. Birnie PhiUp, and from 1861 to 1865 had
been engaged on the decorations of the South Kensing-
ton Museum. During our American war and in the
years immediately following, the trade of Bombay was
exceedingly flourishing, the city was immensely pros-
perous, a spirit of inflation possessed the government
and the people alike, there were great designs for the
improvement and rebuilding of large portions of the
town, and a need was felt for artistic oversight and
direction of the works in hand and contemplated. The
distinction which Mr. Lockwood Kipling had already
won by his native ability and thorough training led to
his being appointed in 1865 to go to Bombay as the pro-
fessor of Architectural Sculpture in the British School
of Art which had been established there.

It was thus that Rudyard Kiphng came to be born
in the most cosmopolitan city of the Eastern world, and
it was there and in its neighbourhood that the first three
years of the boy's life were spent, years in which every
child receives ineffaceable impressions, shaping his con-
ceptions of the world, and in which a child of peculiarly
sensitive nature and active disposition, such as this boy
possessed, lies open to myriad influences that quicken
and give colour to the imagination.

In the spring of 1868 he was taken by his mother for
a visit to England, and there, in the same year, his sister
was born. In the next year his mother returned to India
with both her children, and the boy's next two years
were spent at and near Bombay.

A BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH zia

He was a friendly and receptive child, eager, inter-
ested in all the various entertaining aspects of life in a
city which, ''gleaning all races from all lands,'^ presents
more diversified and picturesque varieties of human
condition than any other, East or West. A little inci-
dent which his mother remembers is not without a
pretty allegoric significance. It was at Nasik, on the
Dekhan plain, not far from Bombay, the little fellow
trudging over the ploughed field, with his hand in that
of the native husbandman, called back to her in the
Hindustani, which was as familiar to him as English,
"Good-by, this is my brother."

In 187 1 Mr. and Mrs. Kipling went with their children
to England, and being compelled to return to India the
next year, they took up the sorrow common to Anglo-
Indian lives, in leaving their children "at home," in
charge of friends at Southsea, near Portsmouth. It was
a hard and sad experience for the boy. The originality
of his nature and the independence of his spirit had al-
ready become clearly manifest, and were likely to render
him unintelligible and perplexing to whosoever might
have charge of him unless they were gifted with unusual
perceptions and quick sympathies. Happily his mother's
sister, Mrs. (now Lady) Burne- Jones, was near at hand,
in case of need, to care for him.

In the sprmg of 1877 Mrs. Kipling came to England
to see her children, and was followed the next year by
her husband. The children were removed from South-
sea, and Rudyard, grown into a companionable, active-
minded, interesting boy, now in his thirteenth year, had
the dehght of spending some weeks in Paris, with his
father, attracted thither by the exhibition of that year.

xiv A BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH

His eyesight had been for some time a source of trouble
to him, and the relief was great from glasses, which were
specially fitted to his eyes, and with which he has never
since been able to dispense.

On the return of his parents to India, early in 1878,
Rudyard was placed at the school of Westward Ho,
at Bideford, in Devon. This school was one chiefly in-
tended for the sons of members of the Indian services,
most of whom were looking forward to following their
father's career as servants of the crown. It was in
charge of an admirable head-master, Mr. Cormell Price,
whose character was such that he won tfie affection of
his boys no less than their respect. The young Kipling
was not an easy boy to manage. He chose his own
way. His talents were such that he might have held
a place near the highest in his studies, but he was content
to let others surpass him in lessons, while he yielded to
his genius in devoting himself to original composition
and to much reading in books of his own choice. He be-
came the editor of the school paper, he contributed to the
columns of the local Bideford Journal, he wrote a quan-
tity of verse, and was venturesome enough to send a
copy of verses to a London journal, which, to his infinite
satisfaction, was accepted and published. Some of his
verses were afterward collected in a Httle volume, pri-
vately printed by his parents at Lahore, with the title
Schoolboy Lyrics. All through his time at school his
letters to his parents in India were such as to make it
clear to them that his future lay in the field of literature.

His literary gifts came to him by inheritance from
both the father and motiier, and they were nurtured and
cultivated in the circle of relatives and family friends

A BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH xv

with whom his holidays were spent. A sub-master at
Westward Ho, though little satisfied with the boy's
progress in the studies of the school, gave to him the lib-
erty of his own excellent library. The holidays were
spent at the Grange, in South Kensington, the home of
his aunt and uncle, Mr. and Mrs. Burne- Jones, and here
he came under the happiest possible domestic influences,
and was brought into contact with men of highest qual-
ity, whose lives were given to letters and the arts, especi-
ally with WilHam Morris, the closest intimate of the
household of the Grange. Other homes were open to
him where the pervading influence was that of intellect-
ual pursuits, and where he had access to libraries
through which he was allowed to wander and to browse
at his will. The good which came to him, directly and
indirectly, from these opportunities can hardly be over-
stated. To know, to love, and to be loved by such a
man as Burne- Jones was a supreme blessing in his life.

In the autumn of 1882, having finished his course at
school, a position was secured for him on the Civil and
Military Gazette, Lahore, and he returned to his parents
in India, who had meanwhile removed from Bombay to
Lahore, where his father was at the head of the most im-
portant school of the arts in India. The Civil and Mil-
itary Gazette is the chief journal of northwestern India,
owned and conducted by the managers and owners of
the Allahabad Pioneer, the ablest and most influential
of all Indian newspapers published in the interior of the
country.

For five years he worked hard and steadily on the
Gazette. Much of the work was simple drudgery.
He shirked nothing. The editor-in-chief was a some-

xvi A BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH

what grim man, who believed in snubbing his subordi-
nates, and who, though he recognised the talents of the
** clever pup," as he called him, and allowed him a pretty
free hand in his contributions to the paper, yet was in-
clined to exact from him the full tale of the heavy routine
work of a newspaper office.

But these were happy years. For the youth was
feeling the spring of his own powers, was full of interest
in nfe, was laying up stores of observation and expe-
rience, and found in his own home not only domestic
happiness, but a s>Tnpathy in taste and a variety of
talent and accomplishment which acted as a continual
stimulus to his own genius. Father, mother, sister, and
brother all played and worked together with rare com-
bination of sympathetic gifts. In 1885 some of the
verses with the writing of which he and his sister had
amused themselves were pubHshed at Lahore, in a little
volume entitled Echoes, because most of them were
lively parodies on some of the poems of the popular
poets of the day. The little book had its moment of
narrowly limited success, and opened the way for the
wider notoriety and success of a volume into which
were gathered the Departmental Ditties that had appeared
from time to time in the Gazette. Many of the stories
also which were afterward collected under the now
familiar title of Plain Tales from tke Hills made their
first appearance in the Gazette, and attracted wide atten-
tion in the Anglo-Indian community.

Kipling's work for five years at Lahore had indeed
been of such quality that it was not surprising that he
was called down to Allahabad, in 1887, to take a place
upon the editorial staff of the Pioneer. The training

A BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH xvii

of an Anglo-Indian journalist is peculiar. He has to
master knowledge of many kinds, to become thoroughly
acquainted with the affairs of the English administra-
tion and the conditions of Anglo-Indian life, and at the
same time with the interests, the modes of Hfe, and
thought of the vast underlying native population. The
higher positions in Indian journalism are places of gen-
uine importance and of large emolument, worthy ob-
jects of ambition for a young man conscious of literary
faculty and inspired with zeal for public ends.

The Pioneer issued a weekly as well as a daily edition,
and in addition to his regular work upon the daily paper,
Kipling continued to write for the weekly issue stories
similar to those which had already won him reputation,
and they now attracted wider attention than ever. His
home at Allahabad was with Professor Hill, a man of
science attached to the Allahabad College. But the
continuity of his life was broken by various journeys
undertaken in the interest of the paper, — one through
Rajputana, from which he wrote a series of descriptive
letters, called Letters of Marque; another to Calcutta
and through Bengal, which resulted in The City of Dread-
ful Night and other letters describing the little-known
conditions of the vast presidency; and, finally, in 1889,
he was sent off by the Pioneer on a tour round the world,
on which he was accompanied by his friends, Professor
and Mrs. Hill. Going first to Japan, he thence came to
America, writing on the way and in America the letters
which appeared in the Pioneer under the title of From
Sea to Sea; and in September, 1889, he arrived in London.

His Indian repute had not preceded him to such
degree as to make the way easy for him through the

xviii A BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH

London crowd. But after a somewhat dreary winter,
during which he had been making acquaintances and
had found irregular employment upon newspapers and
magazines, arrangements were made with Messrs. Mac-
millan & Co. for the publication of an edition of Plain
Tales from the Hills. The book appeared in June.
Its success was immediate. It was republished at once
in America, and was welcomed as warmly on this side
of the Atlantic as on the other. The reprint of Kip-
ling's other Indian stories and of his Departmental Ditties
speedily followed, together with the new tales and
poems which showed the wide range of his creative
genius. Each volume was a fresh success; each extended
the circle of Mr. Kipling's readers, till now he is the most
widely known of English authors. The list which fol-
lows this sketch gives the dates of his many publications.

In 1 89 1 Mr. Kipling left England for a long voyage
to South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, and Ceylon,
and thence to visit his parents at Lahore. On his re-
turn to England, he was married in London to Miss
Balestier, daughter of the late Mr. Wolcott Balestier
of New York. Shortly after their marriage, Mr. and
Mrs. Kipling visited Japan, and in August they came
to America. They established their home at Brattle-
boro, Vermont, where Mrs. Kipling's family had a large
estate; and here, in a pleasant and beautifully situated
house which they had built for themselves, their two
eldest children were born, and here they continued to
live till September, 1896.

During these four years, Mr. Kipling made three
brief visits to England to see his parents, who had left
India and were now settled in the old country.

A BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH xix

The winuy of 1897-98 was spent by Mr. Kipling
and his family, accompanied by his father, in South
Africa. He was everywhere received with the utmost
cordiality and friendliness.

Returning to England in the spring of 1898, he took
a house at Rottingdean, near Brighton, with intention
to make it his permanent home.

Of the late/ incidents of his life there is no need to
speak.

BOOKS BY RUDYARD KIPLING

Schoolboy Lyrics (privately printed). 1882.

Echoes by Two Writers. 1884.

Quartette. The Christmas Annual of the Civil and Military Gazette
by Four Anglo-Indian Writers. Lahore. 1885.

On Her Majesty's Service Only. Departmental Ditties and
Other Verses. To All Heads of Departments and All Anglo-
Indians. Rudyard Kipling, Assistant Department of Public
Journalism. Lahore District. [1886.]

Plain Tales from the Hills. By Rudyard Kipling, author of "De-
partmental Ditties and Other Verses." 1888.

Soldiers Three, A Collection of Stories Setting Forth Certain Passage?
in the Lives and Adventures of Private Terence Mulvaney, Stanley
Ortheris, and John Learoyd. 1888.

The Story or the Gadsbys. [1888.]

In Black and White. [1888.]

Under the Deodars. 1888.

The Phantom 'Rickshaw and Other Tales. [1888.]

Wee Willie Winkle and Other Stories. [1888.]

Departmental Ditties and Other Verses. By Rudyard Kipling.
1 891.

The City of Dreadful Night and Other Places. [1891.]

Life's Handicap, being Stories of Mine Ows People. 1891.

Letters of Marque. 1891.

The Light that Failed, i 89 i .

The Naulahka : A Story of West and East. By Rudyard Elipling and
Wolcott Balestier. 1892.

Ballads and Barrack-room Ballads. 1892.

Many Inventions. 1893.

The Jungle Book. By Rudyard Kipling. 1894.

The Second Jungle Book. 1895.

The Seven Seas. 1896.

Captains Courageous. 1897. .4

The Day's Work. 1S98.

A Fleet in Being. London. 1899.

From Sea to Sea. Letters of Travel, including Letters of Marque, City
of Dreadful Night, and The Smith /idminisLratiou New York, i S99.

PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

LISPETH

Look, you have cast out Love! What Gods are th«se

You bid me please?
The Three in One, the One in Three? Not so !

To my own Gods I go.
It may be they shall give me greater ease
Than your cold Christ and tangled Trinities.

—The Convert.

She was the daughter of Sonoo, a Hill-man of the
Himalayas, and Jadeh his wife. One year their maize
failed, and two bears spent the night in their only opium
poppy-field just above the Sutlej Valley on the Kotgarh
side; so, next season, they turned Christian, and brought
their baby to the Mission to be baptized. The Kotgarh
Chaplain christened her Elizabeth, and ^Lispeth' is the
Hill or pahari pronunciation.

Later, cholera came into the Kotgarh Valley and
carried off Sonoo and Jadeh, and Lispeth became half
servant, half companion, to the wife of the then Chap-
lain of Kotgarh. This was after the reign of the Mo-
ravian missionaries in that place, but before Kotgarh had
quite forgotten her title of 'Mistress of the Northern
Hills.'

Whether Christianity improved Lispeth, or whether
the gods of her own people would have done as much
for her under any circumstances, I do not know; but
she grew very lovely. When a Hill-girl grows lovely,

4 PLiMN TALES FROM THE HILLS

^ she IS worth travelling hfty miles over bad ground to
look upon. Lispeth had a Greek face — one of those

" faces people paint so often, and see so seldom. She
was of a pale, ivory colour, and, for her race, extremely
tall. Also, she possessed eyes that were wonderful;
and, had she not been dressed in the abominable print-
cloths affected by Missions, you would, meeting her on
the hillside unexpectedly, have thought her the original
Diana of the Romans going out to slay.

Lispeth took to Christianity readily, and did not
abandon it when she reached womanhood, as do some
Hill-girls. Her own people hated her because she had,
they said, become a white woman and washed herself
daily; and the Chaplain's wife did not know what to
do with her. One cannot ask a stately goddess, five
foot ten in her shoes, to clean plates and dishes. She
played with the Chaplain's children and took classes
in the Sunday School, and read all the books in the
house, and grew more and more beautiful, like the Prin-
cess in fairy tales. The Chaplain's wife said that the
girl ought to take service in Simla as a nurse or some-
thing 'genteel.' But Lispeth did not want to take ser-
vice. She was very happy where she was.

When travellers— there were not many in those years
— came in to Kotgarh, Lispeth used to lock herself into
her own room for fear they might take her away to
Simla, or out into the unknown world.

One day, a few months after she was seventeen years
old, Lispeth went out for a walk. She did not walk in
the manner of English ladies— a mile and a half out,
with a carriage-ride back again. She covered between
twenty and thirty miles in her little constitutionals^

LISPETH 5

all about and about, between Kotgarh and Narkunda.
This time she came back at full dusk, stepping down
the breakneck descent into Kotgarh with something
heavy in her arms. The Chaplain's wife was dozing
in the drawing-room when Lispeth came in breathing
heavily and very exhausted with her burden. Lispeth
put it down on the sofa, and said simply, 'This is my
husband. I found him on the Bagi Road. He has hurt
himself. We will nurse him, and when he is well, your
husband shall marry him to me.'

This was the first mention Lispeth had ever made
of her matrimonial views, and the Chaplain's wife
shrieked with horror. However, the man on the sofa
needed attention first. He was a young Englishman,
and his head had been cut to the bone by something
jagged. Lispeth said she had found him down the
hillside, and had brought him in. He was breathing
queerly and was unconscious.

He was put to bed and tended by the Chaplain, who
knew something of medicine; and Lispeth waited outside
the door in case she could be useful. She explained to
the Chaplain that this was the man she meant to marry;
and the Chaplain and his wife lectured her severely on the
impropriety of her conduct. Lispeth listened quietly,
and repeated her first proposition. It takes a great deal
of Christianity to wipe out uncivilised Eastern instincts,
such as falling in love at first sight. Lispeth, having
found the man she worshipped, did not see why she should
keep silent as to her choice. She had no intention of
being sent away, either. She was going to nurse that
Englishman until he was well enough to marry her.
This was her programme.

6 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

After a fortnight of slight fever and inflanimation,
the Englishman recovered coherence and thanked the
Chaplain and his wife, and Lispeth — especially Lispeth
— for their kindness. He was a traveller in the East,
he said — they never talked about ^globe-trotters' in
those days, when the P. & 0. fleet was young and small
— and had come from Dehra Dun to hunt for plants
and butterflies among the Simla hills. No one at Simla,
therefore, knew anything about him. He fancied that
he must have fallen over the cliff while reaching out
for a fern on a rotten tree-trunk, and that his coolies
must have stolen his baggage and fled. He thought he
would go back to Simla when he was a little stronger.
He desired no more mountaineering.

He made small haste to go away, and recovered his
strength slowly. Lispeth objected to being advised
either by the Chaplain or his wife; therefore the latter
spoke to the Englishman, and told him how matters
stood in Lispeth's heart. He laughed a good deal, and
said it was very pretty and romantic, but, as he was
engaged to a girl at Home, he fancied that nothing
would happen. Certainly he would behave with dis-
cretion. He did that. Still he found it very pleasant
to talk to Lispeth, and walk with Lispeth and say nice
things to her, and call her pet names, while he was getting
strong enough to go away. It meant nothing at all to
him, and everything in the world to Lispeth. She was
very happy while the fortnight lasted, because she had
found a man to love.

Being a savage by birth, she took no trouble to hide
her feeUngs, and the Englishman was amused. When
he went away, Lispeth walked with him up the Hill as

LISPETH 7

far as Narkunda, very troubled and very miserable. The
Chaplain's wife, being a good Christian and disliking
anything in the shape of fuss or scandal, — ^Lispeth was
beyond her management entirely, — had told the Eng-
lishman to tell Lispeth that he was coming back to marry
her. 'She is but a child you know, and, I fear, at heart
a heathen,' said the Chaplain's wife. So all the twelve
miles up the Hill the Englishman, with his arm round
Lispeth's waist, was assuring the girl that he would come
back and marry her; and Lispeth made him promise over
and over again. She wept on the Narkunda Ridge till
he had passed out of sight along the Muttiani path.

Then she dried her tears and went in to Kotgarh
again, and said to the Chaplain's wife, 'He will come
back and marry me. He has gone to his own people
to tell them so.' And the Chaplain's wife soothed
Lispeth and said, 'He will come back.' At the end
of two months, Lispeth grew impatient, and was told
that the Englishman had gone over the seas to England.
She knew where England was, because she had read
little geography primers; but, of course, she had no
conception of the nature of the sea, being a Hill-girl.
There was an old puzzle-map of the World in the house.
Lispeth had played with it when she was a child. She
unearthed it again, and put it together of evenings, and
cried to herself, and tried to imagine where her English-
man was. As she had no ideas of distance or steam-
boats, her notions were somewhat wild. It would not
have made the least difference had she been perfectly
correct; for the Englishman had no intention of coming
back to marry a Hill-girl. He forgot all about her by the
time he was butterfly-hunting in Assam. He wrote a

S PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

book on the East afterwards. Lispeth's name did not
appear there.

At the end of three months, Lispeth made daily
pilgrimage to Narkunda to see if her Englishman was
coming along the road. It gave her comfort, and the
Chaplain's wife finding her happier thought that she
was getting over her 'barbarous and most indelicate
folly.' A Httle later, the walks ceased to help Lispeth
and her temper grew very bad. The Chaplain's wife
thought this a profitable time to let her know the real
state of affairs— that the Englishman had only promised
his love to keep her quiet— that he had never meant
anything, and that it was wrong and improper of Lispeth
to think of marriage with an EngHshman, who was of a
superior clay, besides being promised in marriage to a
girl of his own people. Lispeth said that all this was
clearly impossible because he had said he loved her, and
the Chaplain's wife had, with her own lips, asserted that
the Englishman was coming back.

'How can what he and you said be untrue?' asked
Lispeth.

'We said it as an excuse to keep you quiet, child/
said the Chaplain's wife.

'Then you have Hed to me,' said Lispeth, 'you and
he?'

The Chaplain's wife bowed her head, and said nothing.
Lispeth was silent, too, for a little time; then she went
out down the valley, and returned in the dress of a Hill-
girl— infamously dirty, but without the nose-stud and
ear-rings. She had her hair braided into the long pigtail,
helped out with black thread, that Hill-women wear.

'I am going back to my own people,' said she. 'You

LlSPETti 0

have killed Lispeth. There is only left old Jadeh's
daughter — the daughter of a pahari and the servant of
Tarka Devi. You are all liars, you English.'

By the time that the Chaplain's wife had recovered
from the shock of the announcement that Lispeth had
Verted to her mother's gods, the girl had gone; and she
never came back.

She took to her own unclean people savagely, as if
to make up the arrears of the life she had stepped out of;
and, in a Httle time, she married a woodcutter who beat
her after the manner of paharis, and her beauty faded
soon.

^ There is no law whereby you can account for the
vagaries of the heathen,' said the Chaplain's wife, 'and
I believe that Lispeth was always at heart an infidel.'
Seeing she had been taken into the Church of England
at the mature age of five weeks, this statement does not
do credit to the Chaplain's wife.

Lispeth was a very old woman when she died. She had
always a perfect command of English, and when she was
sufficiently drunk, could sometimes be induced to tell the
story of her first love-affair.

It was hard then to realise that the bleared, wrinkled
creature, exactly Hke a wisp of charred rag could ever
have been * Lispeth of the Kotgarh Mission.'

THREE AND AN EXTRA

When halter and heel-ropes are slipped, do not give chase with sticki
but with gram. — Punjabi Proverb.

After marriage arrives a reaction, sometimes a big,
sometimes a little one; but it comes sooner or later, and
must be tided over by both parties if they desire the rest
of their Hves to go with the current.

With the Cusack-Bremmils this reaction did not set in
till the third year after the wedding. Bremmil was hard
to hold at the best of times; but he was a good husband
until the baby died and Mrs. Bremmil wore black, and
grew thin, and mourned as though the bottom of the
Universe had fallen out. Perhaps Bremmil ought to
have comforted her. He tried to do so, but the more he
comforted, the more Mrs. Bremmil grieved, and, con-
sequently, the more uncomfortable grew Bremmil. The
fact was that they both needed a tonic. And they got it.
Mrs. Bremmil can afford to laugh now, but it was no
laughing matter to her at the time.

Mrs. Hauksbee appeared on the horizon; and where she
existed was fair chance of trouble. At Simla her by-
name was the 'Stormy Petrel.' She had won that title
five times to my own certain knowledge. She was a little,
brown, thin, almost skinny, woman, with big, rolling,
violet-blue eyes, and the sweetest manners in the world.
You had only to mention her name at afternoon teas foi

THREE AND AN EXTRA ii

every woman in the room to rise up, and call her not
blessed. She was clever, witty, brilliant, and sparkling
beyond most of her kind; but possessed of many devils of
malice and mischievousness. She could be nice, though,
even to her own sex. But that is another story.

Bremmil went off at score after the baby's death and
the general discomfort that followed, and Mrs. Hauksbee
annexed him. She took no pleasure in hiding her cap-
tives. She annexed him publicly, and saw that the
public saw it. He rode with her, and walked with her,
and talked with her, and picnicked with her, and tifhned
at PeHti's with her, till people put up their eyebrows and
said, * Shocking! ' Mrs. Bremmil stayed at home turning
over the dead baby's frocks and crying into the empty
cradle. She did not care to do anything else. But some
eight dear, affectionate lady-friends explained the situ-
ation at length to her in case she should miss the cream of
it. Mrs. Bremmil listened quietly, and thanked them for
their good offices. She was not as clever as Mrs. Hauks-
bee, but she was no fool. She kept her own counsel, and
did not speak to Bremmil of what she had heard. This is
worth remembering. Speaking to, or crying over, a hus-
band never did any good yet.

When Bremmil was at home, which was not often, he
was more affectionate than usual; and that showed his
hand. The affection was forced partly to soothe his own
conscience and partly to soothe Mrs. Bremmil. It failed
in both regards.

Then 'the A.-D.-C. in^Waiting was commanded by
Their Excellencies, Lord and Lady Lytton, to invite Mr.
and Mrs. Cusack-Bremmil to Peterhoff on July 26 and
9-30 p. M.' — 'Dancing ' in the bottom-left-hand corner.

12 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

'I can't go/ said Mrs. Bremmil, 'it is too soon after
poor little Florrie . . . but it need not stop you,
Tom.'

She meant what she said then, and Bremmil said that
he would go just to put in an appearance. Here he spoke
the thing which was not; and Mrs. Bremmil knew it. She
guessed — a woman's guess is much more accurate than a
man's certainty — that he had meant to go from the first,
and with Mrs. Hauksbee. She sat down to think, and the
outcome of her thoughts was that the memory of a dead
child was worth considerably less than the affections of a
living husband. She made her plan and staked her all
upon it. In that hour she discovered that she knew Tom
Bremmil thoroughly, and this knowledge she acted on.

' Tom,' said she, ' I shall be dining out at the Longmores*
on the evening of the 26th. You'd better dine at the
Club.'

This saved Bremmil from making an excuse to get away
and dine with Mrs. Hauksbee, so he was grateful, and felt
small and mean at the same time — which was wholesome.
Bremmil left the house at five for a ride. About half-past
five in the evening a large leather-covered basket came in
from Phelps's for Mrs. Bremmil. She was a woman who
knew how to dress; and she had not spent a week on
designing that dress and having it gored, and hemmed,
and herring-boned, and tucked and rucked (or whatever
the terms are), for nothing. It was a gorgeous dress-
slight mourning. I can't describe it, but it was what The
Queen calls 'a creation' — a thing that hit you straight be-
tween the eyes and made you gasp. She had not much
heart for what she was going to do; but as she glanced at
the long mirror, she had the satisfaction of knowing that

THREE AND AN EXTRA '13

she had never looked so well in her life. She was a large
blonde and, when she chose, carried herself superbly.

After dinner at the Longmores', she went on to the
dance — a little late — and encountered Bremmil with Mrs.
Hauksbee on his arm. That made her flush, and as
the men crowded round her for dances she looked magnifi-
cent. She filled up all her dances except three, and those
she left blank. Mrs. Hauksbee caught her eye once; and
she knew it was war — real war — between them. She
started handicapped in the struggle, for she had ordered
Bremmil about just the least little bit in the world too
much; and he was beginning to resent it. Moreover, he
had never seen his wife look so lovely. He stared at her
from doorways, and glared at her from passages as she
went about with her partners ; and the more he stared, the
more taken was he. He could scarcely believe that this
was the woman with the red eyes and the black stuff gown
who used to weep over the eggs at breakfast.

Mrs. Hauksbee did her best to hold him in play, but,
after two dances, he crossed over to his wife and asked for
a dance.

*I'm afraid youVe come too late, Mister Bremmil,' she
said, with her eyes twinkling.

Then he begged her to give him a dance, and, as a great
favour, she allowed him the fifth waltz. Luckily Five
stood vacant on his programme. They danced it to-
gether, and there was a Httle flutter round the room.
Bremmil had a sort of a notion that his wife could dance,
but he never knew she danced so divinely. At the end of
that waltz he asked for another — as a favour, not as a
right; and Mrs. Bremmil said, ' Show me your programme^
dear! ' He showed it as a naughty little schoolboy hands

U PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

up contraband sweets to a master. There was a fair sprink-
ling of *H' on it, besides ^H' at supper. Mrs. Bremmil
said nothing, but she smiled contemptuously, ran her
pencil through Seven and Nine— two ' H's ' — and returned
the card with her own name written above — a pet name
that only she and her husband used. Then she shook her
finger at him, and said laughing, ' Oh, you silly, silly boy ! '

Mrs. Hauksbee heard that, and — she owned as much-
felt she had the worst of it. Bremmil accepted Seven and
Nine gratefully. They danced Seven, and sat out Nine in
one of the little tents. What Bremmil said and what
Mrs. Bremmil did is no concern of any one.

When the band struck up 'The Roast Beef of Old
England,' the two went out into the verandah, and Brem-
mil began looking for his wife's dandy (this was before
'rickshaw days) while she went into the cloak-room.
Mrs. Hauksbee came up and said, 'You take me in to
supper, I think, Mr. Bremmil? ' Bremmil turned red and
looked foolish, * Ah — h'm ! I'm going home with my wife,
Mrs. Hauksbee. I think there has been a Httle mistake.'
Being a man, he spoke as though Mrs. Hauksbee were
entirely responsible.

Mrs. Bremmil came out of the cloak-room in a swans-
down cloak with a white 'cloud' round her head. She
looked radiant; and she had a right to.

The couple went off into the darkness together, Brem-
mil riding very close to the dandy.

Then said Mrs. Hauksbee to me — she looked a trifle
faded and jaded in the lamplight— ' Take my word for it,
the silliest woman can manage a clever man; but it needs
a very clever woman to manage a fool.'

Then we went in to supper.

THROWN AWAY

And some are sulky, while some will plunge.

[So ho I Steady I Stand still, you !]
Some you must gentle, and some you must lunge.

[There ! There I Who wants to kill you ?]
Some — there are losses in every trade —
Will break their hearts ere bitted and made,
Will fight like fiends as the rope cuts hard,
And die dumb-mad in the breaking-yard.

— Toolungala Stockyard Ck»rus.

To rear a boy under what parents call the ' sheltered life
system' is, if the boy must go into the world and fend for
himself, not wise. Unless he be one in a thousand he has
certainly to pass through many unnecessary troubles;
and may, possibly, come to extreme grief simply from ig-
norance of the proper proportions of things.

Let a puppy eat the soap in the bath-room or chew a
newly blacked boot. He chews and chuckles until, by and
by, he finds out that blacking and Old Brown Windsor
make him very sick; so he argues that soap and boots are
not wholesome. Any old dog about the house will soon
show him the unwisdom of biting big dogs' ears. Being
young, he remembers and goes abroad, at six months, a
well-mannered Uttle beast with a chastened appetite. If
he had been kept away from boots, and soap, and big
dogs till he came to the trinity full-grown and with de-
veloped teeth, consider how fearfully sick and thrashed he

x6 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

would be! Apply that notion to the 'sheltered life,' and
see how it works. It does not sound pretty, but it is the
better of the two evils.

There was a Boy once who had been brought up under
the ' sheltered life ' theory; and the theory killed him dead.
He stayed with his people all his days, from the hour he
was born till the hour he went into Sandhurst nearly at the
top of the list. He was beautifully taught in all that wins
marks by a private tutor, and carried the extra weight of
'never having given his parents an hour's anxiety in his
life.' What he learnt at Sandhurst beyond the regular
routine is of no consequence. He looked about him, and
he found soap and blacking, so to speak, very good. He
ate a Kttle, and came out of Sandhurst not so high as he
went in. Then there was an interval and a scene with his
people, who expected much from him. Next a year of
living unspotted from the world in a third-rate dep6t
battalion, where all the juniors were children and all the
seniors old women; and lastly he came out to India, where
he was cut off from the support of his parents, and had no
one to fall back on in time of trouble except himself.

Now India is a place beyond aU others where one must
not take things too seriously — the mid-day sun always
excepted. Too much work and too much energy kill a
man just as effectively as too much assorted vice or too
much drink. Flirtation does not matter, because every
one is being transferred and either you or she leave the
Station, and never return. Good work does not matter,
because a man is judged by his worst output and another
man takes all the credit of his best as a rule. Bad work
does not matter, because other men do worse and in-
competents hang on longer in India than anywhere else.

THROWN AWAY 17

Amusements do not matter, because you must repeat
them as soon as you have accomplished them once, and
most amusements only mean trying to win another
person's money. Sickness does not matter, because it's
all in the day's work, and if you die, another man takes
over your place and your office in the eight hours between
death and burial. Nothing matters except Home-fur-
lough and acting allowances, and these only because they
are scarce. It is a slack country, where all men work with
imperfect instruments; and the wisest thing is to escape
as soon as ever you can to some place where amusement is
amusement and a reputation worth the having.

But this Boy — the tale is as old as the Hills — came out,
and took all things seriously. He was pretty and was
petted. He took the pettings seriously and fretted over
women not worth saddling a pony to call upon. He found
his new free life in India very good. It does look attrac-
tive in the beginning, from a subaltern's point of view — all
ponies, partners, dancing, and so on. He tasted it as the
puppy tastes the soap. Only he came late to the eating,
with a grown set of teeth. He had no sense of balance —
just like the puppy — and could not understand why he
was not treated with the consideration he received under
his father's roof. This hurt his feelings.

He quarrelled with other boys and, being sensitive to
the marrow, remembered these quarrels, and they excited
him. He found whist and gymkhanas, and things of that
kind (meant to amuse one after office) good; but he took
them seriously too, just as seriously as he took the *head'
that followed after drink. He lost his money over whist
and g>Tnkhanas because they were new to him.

He took his losses seriously, and wasted as much energ>

ig PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

and interest over a two-goldmohur race for maiden ekka-
ponies with their manes hogged, as if it had been the
Derby. One half of this came from inexperience — much as
the puppy squabbles with the corner of the hearthrug —
and the other half from the dizziness bred by stumbling
out of his quiet life into the glare and excitement of a
livelier one. No one told him about the soap and the
blacking, because an average man takes it for granted that
an average man is ordinarily careful in regard to them.
It was pitiful to watch The Boy knocking himself to
pieces, as an over-handled colt falls down and cuts him-
self when he gets away from the groom.

This unbridled license in amusements not worth the
trouble of breaking line for, much less rioting over, en-
dured for six months — all through one cold weather — and
then we thought that the heat and the knowledge of hav-
ing lost his money and health and lamed his horses would
sober The Boy down, and he would stand steady. In
ninety-nine cases out of a hundred this would have hap-
pened. You can see the principle working in any Indian
Station. But this particular case fell through because
The Boy was sensitive and took things seriously — as I
may have said some seven times before. Of course, we
could not tell how his excesses struck him personally.
They were nothing very heartbreaking or above the
average. He might be crippled for life financially, and
want a little nursing. Still the memory of his perform-
ances would wither away in one hot weather, and the
bankers would help him to tide over the money-troubles.
But he must have taken another view altogether and have
believed himself ruined beyond redemption. His Colonel
talked to him severely when the cold weather ended.

THROWN AWAY ig

That made him more wretched than ever; and it was only
an ordinary 'Colonel's wigging'!

What follows is a curious instance of the fashion in
which we are all linked together and made responsible for
one another. The thing that kicked the beam in The
Boy's mind was a remark that a woman made when he
was talking to her. There is no use in repeating it, for it
was only a cruel Httle sentence, rapped out before think-
ing, that made him flush to the roots of his hair. He kept
himself to himself for three days, and then put in for two
days' leave to go shooting near a Canal Engineer's Rest
House about thirty miles out. He got his leave, and that
night at Mess was noisier and more offensive than ever.
He said that he was 'going to shoot big game,' and left at
half-past ten o'clock in an ekka. Partridge — which was
the only thing a man could get near the Rest House — is
not big game; so every one laughed.

Next morning one of the Majors came in from short
leave and heard that The Boy had gone out to shoot *big
game.' The Major had taken an interest in The Boy, and
had, more than once, tried to check him. The Major put
up his eyebrows when he heard of the expedition, and
went to The Boy's rooms, where he rummaged.

Presently he came out and found me leaving cards on
the Mess. There was no one else in the ante-room.

He said, ' The Boy has gone out shooting. Does a man
shoot tetur with a revolver and writing-case? '

I said, 'Nonsense, Major!' for I saw what was in his
mind.

He said, 'Nonsense or no nonsense, I'm going to the
Canal now — at once. I don't feel easy.'

Then he thought for a minute, and said, 'Can you lie?*

20 PLAIN TALES FROM THE fflLLS

•You know best/ I answered. 'It's my profession.'

'Very well,' said the Major, 'you must come out with
me now — at once — in an ekka to the Canal to shoot black-
bu'^k. Go and put on shikar-kit — quick — and drive here
with a gun.'

The Major was a masterful man; and I knew that
be would not give orders for nothing. So I obeyed, and
en return found the Major packed up in an ekka — gun-
tases and food slung below — all ready for a shooting-
trip.

He dismissed the driver and drove himself. We jogged
along quietly while in the station; but, as soon as we got
to the dusty road across the plains, he made that pony fly.
A ».ountry-bred can do nearly anything at a pinch. We
covered the thirty miles in under three hours, but the
poor brute was nearly dead.

Once I said, 'What's the blazing hurry, Major?'

He said quietly, 'The Boy has been alone, by himself
for — one, two, five, — fourteen hours now! I tell you, I
don't feel easy.'

This uneasiness spread itself to me, and I helped to beat
the pony.

When we came to the Canal Engineer's Rest House the
Major called for The Boy's servant; but there was no
answer. Then we went up to the house, calling for The
Boy by name; but there was no answer.

' Oh, he's out shooting,' said I.

Just then, I saw through one of the windows a little
hurricane-lamp burning. This was at four in the after-
noon. We both stopped dead in the verandah, holding
our breath to catch every sound; and we heard, inside the
room, the 'brr—brr — brr' of a multitude of flies. The

THROWN AWAY 9t

Major said nothing, but he took off his hehnet and we
entered very softly.

The Boy was dead on the bed in the centre of the bare,
lime- washed room. He had shot his head nearly to pieces
with his revolver. The gun-cases were still strapped, so
was the bedding, and on the table lay The Boy's writing-
case with photographs. He had gone away to die like a
poisoned rat!

The Major said to himself softly, Toor Boy! Poor,
poor devil ! ' Then he turned away from the bed and said,
*I want your help in this business.'

Knowing The Boy was dead by his own hand, I saw
exactly what that help would be, so I passed over to the
table, took a chair, Ht a cheroot, and began to go through
the writing-case; the Major looking over my shoulder and
repeating to himself, *We came too late! — ^Like a rat in
a hole! — Poor, poor devil!'

The Boy must have spent half the night in writing to
ois people, to his Colonel, and to a girl at Home; and as
soon as he had finished, must have shot himseK, for he had
been dead a long time when we came in.

I read all that he had written, and passed over each
sheet to the Major as I finished it.

We saw from his accounts how very seriously he had
taken everything. He wrote about 'disgrace which he
was unable to bear' — 'indeHble shame' — 'criminal folly'
— 'wasted Hfe,' and so on; besides a lot of private things
to his father and mother much too sacred to put into
print. The letter to the girl at Home was the most pitiful
of all; and I choked as I read it. The Major made no
attempt to keep dry-eyed. I respected him for that. He
tead and rocked himself to and fro, and simply cried like a

t2 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS 3

Vv'oman without trying to hide it. The letters were so
dreary and hopeless and touching. We forgot all about
The Boy's follies, and only thought of the poor Thing on
the bed and the scrawled sheets in our hands. It was ut-
terly impossible to let the letters go Home. They would
have broken his father's heart and killed his mother after
killing her belief in her son.

At last the Major dried his eyes openly, and said, 'Nice
sort of thing to spring on an English family ! What shall
we do? '

I said, knowing what the Major had brought me out for,
— 'The Boy died of cholera. We were with him at the
time. We can't commit ourselves to half-measures.
Come along.'

Then began one of the most grimly comic scenes I have
ever taken part in — the concoction of a big, written lie,
bolstered with evidence, to soothe The Boy's people at
Home. I began the rough draft of the letter, the Major
throwing in hints here and there while he gathered up all
the stuff that The Boy had written and burnt it in the
fireplace. It was a hot, still evening when we began, and
the lamp burned very badly. In due course I made the
draft to my satisfaction, setting forth how The Boy was
the pattern of all virtues, beloved by his regiment, with
every promise of a great career before him, and so on;
how we had helped him through the sickness — it was no
time for little lies you will understand — and how he had
died without pain. I choked while I was putting down
these things and thinking of the poor people who would
read them. Then I laughed at the grotesqueness of the
affair, and the laughter mixed itself up with the choke —
and the Major said that we both wanted drinks.

THROWN AWAY

23

I am afraid to say how much whisky we drank before
the letter was finished. It had not the least effect on us.
Then we took off The Boy's watch, locket, and rings.

Lastly, the Major said, 'We must send a lock of hair
too. A woman values that.'

But there were reasons why we could not find a lock fit
to send. The boy was black-haired, and so was the Major,
luckily. I cut off a piece of the Major's hair above the
temple with a knife, and put it into the packet we were
making. The laughing-fit and the chokes got hold of me
again, and I had to stop. The Major was nearly as bad;
and we both knew that the worst part of the work was to
come.

We sealed up the packet, photographs, locket, seals,
ring, letter, and lock of hair with The Boy's sealing-wax
and The Boy's seal.

Then the Major said, ' For God's sake let's get outside
^— away from the room — and think! '

We went outside, and walked on the banks of the Canal
for an hour, eating and drinking what we had with us,
until the moon rose. I know now exactly how a murderer
feels. Finally, we forced ourselves back to the room with
the lamp and the Other Thing in it, and began to take up
the next piece of work. I am not going to write about
this. It was too horrible. We burned the bedstead and
dropped the ashes into the Canal; we took up the matting
of the room and treated that in the same way. I went off
to a village and borrowed two big hoes, — I did not want
the villagers to help, — while the Major arranged — the
other matters. It took us four hours' hard work to make
the grave. As we worked, we argued out whether it was
right to say as much as we remembered of the Burial of

24 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

the Dead. We compromised things by saying the Lord^a
Prayer with a private unofficial prayer for the peace
of the soul of The Boy. Then we filled in the grave and
went into the verandah — not the house — to He down to
sleep. We were dead-tired.

When we woke the Major said wearily, 'We can't go
back till to-morrow. We must give him a decent time to
die in. He died early this morning, remember. That
seems more natural. ' So the Major must have been lying
awake all the time, thinking.

I said, 'Then why didn't we bring the body back to
cantonments? '

The Major thought for a minute. 'Because the people
bolted when they heard of the cholera. And the ekka has
gone!'

That was strictly true. We had forgotten all about the
ekka-i^ony, and he had gone home.

So we were left there alone, all that stifling day, in the
Canal Rest House, testing and re-testing our story of The
Boy's death to see if it was weak in any point. A native
appeared in the afternoon, but we said that a Sahih was
dead of cholera, and he ran away. As the dusk gathered,
the Major told me all his fears about The Boy, and awful
stories of suicide or nearly carried-out suicide — tales that
made one's hair crisp. He said that he himself had once
gone into the same Valley of the Shadow as The Boy,
when he was young and new to the country; so he under-
stood how things fought together in The Boy's pool
jumbled head. He also said that youngsters, in their re*
pentant moments, consider their sins much more serious
and ineffaceable than they really are. We talked together
all through the evening and rehearsed the story of the

THROWN AWAY 25

death of The Boy. As soon as the moon was up, and The
Boy, theoretically, just buried, we struck across coimtry
for the Station. We walked from eight till six o'clock in
the morning; but though we were dead-tired, we did not
forget to go to The Boy's rooms and put away his revolver
with the proper amount of cartridges in the pouch. Also
to set his writing-case on the table. We found the Colonel
and reported the death, feeling more like murderers than
ever. Then we went to bed and slept the clock round; for
there was no more in us.

The tale had credence as long as was necessary; for
every one forgot about The Boy before a fortnight was
over. Many people, however, found time to say that the
Major had behaved scandalously in not bringing in the
body for a regimental funeral. The saddest thing of all
was the letter from The Boy's mother to the Major and me
— with big inky bHsters all over the sheet. She wrote the
sweetest possible things about our great kindness, and the
obligation she would be under to us as long as she lived.

All things considered, she was under an obligation; but
not exactly as she meant.

MISS YOUGHAL'S SAIS

When Man and Woman are agreed, what can the Kazi do?

— Proverb.

Some people say that there is no romance in India. Those
people are wrong. Our lives hold quite as much romance
as is good for us. Sometimes more.

Strickland was in the Police, and people did not under-
stand him; so they said he was a doubtful sort of man, and
passed by on the other side. Strickland had himself to
thank for this. He held the extraordinary theory that a
Policeman in India should try to know as much about the
natives as the natives themselves. Now, in the whole of
Upper India, there is only one man who can pass for
Hindu or Mohammedan, hide-dresser or priest, as he
pleases. He is feared and respected by the natives from
the Ghor Kathri to the Jamma Musjid; and he is sup-
posed to have the gift of invisibility and executive control
over many Devils. But this has done him no good in the
eyes of the Indian Government.

Strickland was foolish enough to take that man for hia
model; and, following out his absurd theory, dabbled in
unsavoury places no respectable man would think of ex-
ploring— all among the native riff-raff. He educated him-
self in this peculiar way for seven years, and people could
not appreciate it. He was perpetually 'going Fantee'
among natives, which, of course, no man with any sense

26

MISS YOUGHAL*S SAIS 27

believes in. He was initiated into the Sat Bhai at Allaha-
bad once, when he was on leave; he knew the Lizzard
Song of the Sansis, and the Hdlli-Hukk dance, which is a
religious can-can of a startling kind. When a man knows
who dance the Hdlli-Hukk, and how, and when, and
where, he knows something to be proud of. He has gone
deeper than the skin. But Strickland was not proud,
though he had helped once, at Jagadhri, at the Painting
of the Death Bull, which no EngHshman must even look
upon; had mastered the thieves'-patter of the chdngars;
had taken a Eusufzai horse- thief alone near Attock; and
had stood under the sounding-board of a Border mosque
and conducted service in the manner of a Sunni MoUah.
His crowning achievement was spending eleven days
as a faquir or priest in the gardens of Baba Atal at
Amritsar, and there picking up the threads of the great
Nasiban Murder Case. But people said, justly enough,
'Why on earth can't Strickland sit in his ofhce and
write up his diary, and recruit, and keep quiet, instead
of showing up the incapacity of his seniors?^ So the
Nasiban Murder Case did him no good departmentally;
but, after his first feeling of wrath, he returned to his
outlandish custom of prying into native life. When
a man once acquires a taste for this particular amuse-
ment, it abides with him all his days. It is the most
fascinating thing in the world; Love not excepted.
Where other men took ten days to the Hills, Strickland
took leave for what he called shikar, put on the disguise
that appealed to him at the time, stepped down into the
brown crowd, and was swallowed up for a while. He
was a quiet, dark yoimg feUow — spare, black-eyed —
and, when he was not thinking of something else, a very

s8 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

interesting companion . S trickland on Native Progress as
he had seen it was worth hearing. Natives hated Strick-
land ; but they were afraid of him. He knew too much.

When the Youghals came into the station, Strick-
land— very gravely, as he did everything — fell in love
with Miss Youghal; and she, after a while, feU in love
with him because she could not understand him. Then
Strickland told the parents; but Mrs. Youghal said
she was not going to tlirow her daughter into the worst
paid Department in the Empire, and old Youghal said,
in so many words, that he mistrusted Strickland's ways
and works, and would thank him not to speak or write
to his daughter any more. 'Very weU,' said Strickland,
for he did not wish to make his lady-love's life a burden.
After one long talk with Miss Youghal he dropped the
business entirely.

The Youghals went up to Simla in April.

In July Strickland secured three months' leave on
'urgent private affairs.' He locked up his house —
though not a native in the Province would wittingly
have touched 'Estreekin Sahib's' gear for the world—
and went down to see a friend of his, an old dyer, at
Tarn Taran.

Here all trace of him was lost, until a sais or groom met
me on the Simla Mall with this extraordinary note:—

Dear old Man, — Please give bearer a box of cheroots — Supers, No. i,
for preference. They are freshest at the Club. I'll repay when I re-
apper*-: but at present I'm out of society.— Yours,

E. Strickland.

I Oi-dered two boxes, and handed them over to the
sais with my love. That sais was Strickland, and he

MISS YOUGHAL'S SAIS 99

v^as in old YoughaFs employ, attached to Miss You^
ghal's Arab. The poor fellow was suffering for an English
smoke, and knew that, whatever happened, I should hold
my tongue till the business was over.

Later on, Mrs. Youghal, who was wrapped up in
her servants, began talking at houses where she called of
her paragon among saises — the man who was never
too busy to get up in the morning and pick flowers for
the breakfast-table, and who blacked — actually blacked
— the hoofs of his horse like a London coachman I The
turn-out of Miss Youghal's Arab was a wonder and a de-
light. Strickland — Dulloo, I mean — found his reward
in the pretty things that Miss Youghal said to him when
she went out riding. Her parents were pleased to find
she had forgotten all her foolishness for young Strickland,
ind said she was a good girl.

Strickland vows that the two months of his service
were the most rigid mental discipline he has ever gone
through. Quite apart from the little fact that the wife
of one of his idiow-saises fell in love with him and then
tried to poison him with arsenic because he would have
nothing to do with her, he had to school himself into keep-
mg quiet when Miss Youghal went out riding with some
man who tried to flirt with her, and he was forced to trot
behind carrying the blanket and hearing every word!
Also, he had to keep his temper when he was slanged in
the theatre porch by a poHceman — especially once when
he was abused by a Naik he had himself recruited
from Isser Jang village — or, worse still, when a young
subaltern called him a pig for not making way quickly
enough.

But the life had its compensations. He obtained

3© PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

great insight into the ways and thefts of saises — enough
he says to have siunmarily convicted half the population
of the Punjab if he had been on business. He became
one of the leading players at knuckle-bones, which all
jhampdnis and many saises play while they are waiting
outside the Government House or the Gaiety Theatre of
nights; he learned to smoke tobacco that was three-
fourths cowdung; and he heard the wisdom of the griz-
zled Jemadar of the Government House grooms. Whose
words are valuable. He saw many things which amused
him; and he states, on honour, that no man can
appreciate Simla properly till he has seen it from the
sais's point of view. He also says that, if he chose
to write all he saw, his head would be broken in several
places.

Strickland's account of the agony he endured on
wet nights, hearing the music and seeing the Kghts
in 'Benmore,' with his toes tingling for a waltz and
his head in a horse-blanket, is rather amusing. One of
these days, Strickland is going to write a little book
on his experiences. That book will be worth buying,
and even more worth suppressing.

Thus, he served faithfully as Jacob served for Rachel;
and his leave was nearly at an end when the explosion
came. He had really done his best to keep his temper
in the hearing of the flirtations I have mentioned; but
he broke down at last. An old and very distinguished
General took Miss Youghal for a ride, and began that
specially offensive 'you're-only-a-little-girl' sort of flirta-
tion— most difficult for a woman to turn aside deftly,
and most maddening to Us ten to. Miss Youghal was
shaking with fear at the things he said in the hearing of

MISS YOUGHAL'S SAIS 31

her sais. DuUoo — Strickland — stood it as long as he
could. Then he caught hold of the General's bridle,
and, in most fluent EngHsh, invited him to step off and
be flung over the cliff. Next minute, Miss Youghal
began to cry; and Strickland saw that he had hopelessly
given himself away, and everything was over.

The General nearly had a fit, while Miss Youghal
was sobbing out the story of the disguise and the en-
gagement that was not recognised by the parents.
Strickland was furiously angry with himself, and more
angry with the General for forcing his hand; so he said
nothing, but held the horse's head and prepared to
thrash the General as some sort of satisfaction. But
when the General had thoroughly grasped the story,
and knew who Strickland was, he began to puff and
blow in the saddle, and nearly rolled off with laughing.
He said Strickland deserved a V. C, if it were only foi
putting on a sais's blanket. Then he called himself
names, and vowed that he deserved a thrashing, but he
was too old to take it from Strickland. Then he com-
plimented Miss Youghal on her lover. The scandal of
the business never struck him; for he was a nice old
man, with a weakness for flirtations. Then he laughed
again, and said that old Youghal was a fool. Strick-
land let go of the cob's head, and suggested that the
General had better help them, if that was his opinion.
Strickland knew Youghal' s weakness for men with titles
and letters after their names and high official position.
'It's rather like a forty-minute farce,' said the General,
'but, begad, I will help, if it's only to escape that tremen-
dous thrashing I deserve. Go along to your home, my
5aw-Policeman, and change into decent kit, and I'll

32 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

attack Mr. Youghal. Miss Youghal, may I ask you tA
canter home and wait? '

About seven minutes later, there was a wild hurroosh
at the Club. A sais, with blanket and headrope, was
asking all the men he knew: 'For Heaven's sake lend
me decent clothes!' As the men did not recognise him,
there were some pecuHar scenes before Strickland
could get a hot bath, with soda in it, in one room, a
shirt here, a collar there, a pair of trousers elsewhere, and
so on. He galloped off, with half the Club wardrobe
on his back, and an utter stranger's pony under him, to
the house of old Youghal. The General, arrayed in pur-
ple and fine Unen, was before him. What the General
had said Strickland never knew, but Youghal received
Strickland with moderate civility; and Mrs. Youghal,
touched by the devotion of the transformed Dulloo, was
almost kind. The General beamed and chuckled, and
Miss Youghal came in, and, almost before old Youghal
knew where he was, the parental consent had been
wrenched out, and Strickland had departed with Miss
Youghal to the Telegraph Office to wire for his European
kit. The final embarrassment was when the stranger
attacked him on the Mall and asked for the stolen pony.

In the end, Strickland and Miss Youghal were mar-
ried, on the strict imderstanding that Strickland should
drop his old ways, and stick to Departmental routine,
which pays best and leads to Simla. Strickland was
far too fond of his wife, just then, to break his word, but
it was a sore trial to him; for the streets and the bazars,
and tht soimds in them, were full of meaning to Strick-

MISS YOUGHAL'S SAIS 33

land, and these called to him to come back and take
up his wanderings and his discoveries. Some day, I
will tell you how he broke his promise to help a friend.
That was long since, and he has, by this time, been nearly
spoilt for what he would call shikar. He is forgetting the
slang, and the beggar's cant, and the marks, and the
signs, and the drift of the under-currents, which, if a
man would master, he must always continue to learn.
But he fills in his Departmental returns beautifully.

* YOKED WITH AN UNBELIEVER'

I am dying for you, and you are dying for another.

— Punjabi Proverb.

When the Gravesend tender left the P. & O. steamer
for Bombay and went back to catch the train to Town,
there were many people in it crying. But the one
who wept most, and most openly, was Miss Agnes.
Laiter. She had reason to cry, because the only man
she ever loved — or ever could love, so she said — was
going out to India; and India, as every one knows, is
divided equally between jungle, tigers, cobras, cholera,
and sepoys.

Phil Garron, leaning over the side of the steamer
in the rain, felt very unhappy too; but he did not cry.
He was sent out to 'tea.' What 'tea' meant he had
not the vaguest idea, but fancied that he would have to
ride on a prancing horse over hiUs covered with tea- vines,
and draw a sumptuous salary for doing so; and he was
very grateful to his imcle for getting hun the berth. He
was really going to reform all his slack, shiftless ways,
save a large proportion of his magnificent salary yearly,
and, m a very short time, return to marry Agnes Laiter.
Phil Garron had been lying loose on his friends' hands for
three years, and, as he had nothmg to do, he naturally
fell in love. He was very nice; but he was not strong in
his views and opinions and principles, and though he

34

*YOKED WITH AN UNBELIEVER' 35

never came to actual grief his friends were thankful
when he said good-bye, and went out to this mysterious
* tea ' business near Darjiling. They said, ^ God bless you,
dear boy! Let us never see your face again,' — or at
least that was what Phil was given to understand.

When he sailed, he was very full of a great plan to
prove himself several hundred times better than any
one had given him credit for — to work like a horse,
and triumphantly marry Agnes Laiter. He had many
good points besides his good looks; his only fault being
that he was weak, the least Httle bit in the world weak.
He had as much notion of economy as the Morning Sun;
and yet you could not lay your hand on any one item,
and say, ^Herein Phil Garron is extravagant or reckless.*
Nor could you point out any particular vice in his char-
acter; but he was ^unsatisfactory' and as workable as
putty.

Agnes Laiter went about her duties at home — her
family objected to the engagement — with red eyes, while
Phil was sailing to Darjiling — a 'port on the Bengal
Ocean,' as his mother used to tell her friends. He was
popular enough on board ship, made many acquaintances
and'a moderately large Kquor-bill, and sent off huge letters
to Agnes Laiter at each port. Then he fell to work on this
plantation, somewhere between Darjiling and Kangra,
and, though the salary and the horse and the work were
not quite all he had fancied, he succeeded fairly well, and
gave himself much unnecessary credit for his persever-
ance.

In the course of time, as he settled more into collar, and
his work grew fixed before him, the face of Agnes Laiter
went out of his mind and only came when he was at

36 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

leisure, which was not often. He would forget all about
ier for a fortnight, and remember her with a start, like a
schoolboy who has forgotten to learn his lesson. She did
not forget Phil, because she was of the kind that never
forgets. Only, another man — a really desirable young
man — presented himself before Mrs. Laiter; and the
chance of a marriage with Phil was as far off as ever; and
his letters were so unsatisfactory; and there was a certain
amount of domestic pressure brought to bear on the girl;
and the young man really was an eHgible person as in-
comes go; and the end of all things was that Agnes
married him, and wrote a tempestuous whirlwind of a
letter to Phil in the wilds of Darjiling, and said she should
never know a happy moment all the rest of her life. Which
was a true prophecy.

Phil received that letter, and held himself ill-treated.
This was two years after he had come out; but by dint of
thinking fixedly of Agnes Laiter, and looking at her
photograph, and patting himself on the back for being
one of the most constant lovers in history, and warming
to the work as he went on, he really fancied that he had
been very hardly used. He sat down and wrote one final
letter— a really pathetic 'world without end, amen,' epis-
tle; explaining how he would be true to Eternity, and that
all women were very much alike, and he would hide
his broken heart, etc. etc.; but if, etc. etc., at any
future time, etc. etc., he could afford to wait, etc. etc.,
unchanged affections, etc. etc., return to her old love, etc.
etc., for eight closely written pages. From an artistic
point of view, it was very neat work, but an ordinary
Philistine, who knew the state of Phil's real feelings,— not
the ones he rose to as he went on writing,— would have

* YOKED WITH AN UNBELIEVER' 37

called it the thoroughly mean and selfish work of a thor-
oughly mean and selfish weak man. But this verdict
would have been incorrect. Phil paid for the postage,
and felt every word he had written for at least two days
and a half. It was the last flicker before the light went out.

That letter made Agnes Laiter very imhappy, and she
cried and put it away in her desk, and became Mrs. Some-
body Else for the good of her family. Which is the first
duty of every Christian maid.

Phil went his ways, and thought no more of his letter,
except as an artist thinks of a neatly touched-in sketch.
His ways were not bad, but they were not altogether good
until they brought him across Dunmaya, the daughter of a
Rajput ex-Subadar-Major of our Native Army. The
girl had a strain of Hill blood in her, and, like the Hill-
women, was not a purdah-nashin or woman who lives be-
hind the veil. Where Phil met her, or how he heard of her,
does not matter. She was a good girl and handsome, and,
in her way, very clever and shrewd; though, of course, a
little hard. It is to be remembered that Phil was living
very comfortably, denying himself no small luxury, never
putting by a penny, very satisfied with himself and his
good intentions, was dropping all his English correspond-
ents one by one, and beginning more and more to look
upon India as his home. Some men fall this way; and
they are of no use afterwards. The climate where he
was stationed was good, and it really did not seem to him
that there was any reason to return to England.

He did what many planters have done before him — that
is to say, he made up his mind to marry a Hill-girl and
settle down. He was seven-and-twenty then, with a long
life before him, but no spirit to go through with it. So he

38 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

married Dunmay a by the forms of the English Church, and
some fellow-planters said he was a fool, and some said he
was a wise man. Dunmaya was a thoroughly honest
girl, and, in spite of her reverence for an Englishman, had
a reasonable estimate of her husband's weaknesses. She
managed him tenderly, and became, in less than a year, a
very passable imitation of an English lady in dress and
carriage. It is curious to think that a Hill-man after a
lifetime's education is a Hill-man still; but a Hill- woman
can in six months master most of the ways of her English
sisters. There was a coolie-woman once. But that is an-
other story. Dunmaya dressed by preference in black
and yellow and looked well.

Meantime Phil's letter lay in Agnes Laiter's desk, and
now and again she would think of poor, resolute, hard-
working Phil among the cobras and tigers of Darjiling,
toiling in the vain hope that she might come back to him.
Her husband was worth ten Phils, except that he had
rheumatism of the heart. Three years after he was
married, — and after he had tried Nice and Algeria for his
complaint, — he went to Bombay, where he died, and set
Agnes free. Being a devout woman, she looked on his
death and the place of it as a direct interposition of Provi-
ence, and when she had recovered from the shock, she
took out and re-read Phil's letter with the ^etc. etc.,' and
the big dashes, and the Httle dashes, and kissed it several
times. No one knew her in Bombay; she had her hus-
band's income, which was a large one, and Phil was close
at hand. It was wrong and improper, of course, but she
decided, as heroines do in novels, to find her old lover, to
offer him her hand and her gold, and with him spend the
rest of her life in some spot far from unsympathetic souls.

'YOKED WITH AN UNBELIEVER' 39

She sat for two months, alone in Watson's Hotel, elabo^
rating this decision, and the picture was a pretty one.
Then she set out in search of Phil Garron, Assistant on a
tea plantation with a more than usually unpronounceable
name.

She found him. She spent a month over it, for hit
plantation was not in the DarjiHng district at all, but
nearer Kangra. Phil wa« very httle altered, and Dim-
maya was very nice to her.

Now the particular sin and shame of the whole business
is that Phil, who really is not worth thinking of twice,
was and is loved by Dunmaya, and more than loved by
Agnes, the whole of whose life he seems to have spoilt.

Worst of all, Dunmaya is making a decent man of him;
and he will ultimately be saved from perdition through
her training.

Which is manifestly unfair.

FALSE DAWN

To-night God knows what thing shall tide,

The Earth is racked and faint —
Expectant, sleepless, open-eyed;
And we, who from the Earth were made,

Thrill with our Mother's pain.

— In Durance.

No man will ever know the exact truth of this story;
though women may sometimes whisper it to one another
after a dance, when they are putting up their hair for the
night and comparing lists of victims. A man, of course,
cannot assist at these functions. So the tale must be told
from the outside — in the dark — all wrong.

Never praise a sister to a sister, in the hope of your
compliments reaching the proper ears, and so preparing
the way for you later on. Sisters are women first, and
sisters afterwards; and you will find that you do yourseh
harm.

Saumarez knew this when he made up his mind to pro-
pose to the elder Miss Copleigh. Saumarez was a strange
man, with few merits so far as men could see, though he
was popular with women, and carried enough conceit to
stock a Viceroy's Council and leave a little over for the
Commander-in-Chief's Staff. He was a Civilian. Very
many women took an interest in Saumarez, perhaps, be-
cause his manner to them was offensive. If you hit a

40

FALSE DAWN 41

pony over the nose at the outset of your acquaintance, he
may not love you, but he will take a deep interest in your
:novements ever afterwards. The elder Miss Copleigh was
nice, plump, winning, and pretty. The younger was not
so pretty, and, from men disregarding the hint set forth
above, her style was repellent and unattractive. Both
girls had, practically, the same figure, and there was a
strong Hkeness between them in look and voice; though
no one could doubt for an instant which was the nicer of
the two.

Saumarez made up his mind, as soon as they came into
the station from Behar, to marry the elder one. At least,
we all made sure that he would, which comes to the same
thing. She was two-and-twenty, and he was thirty-three,
with pay and allowances of nearly fourteen hundred
rupees a month. So the match, as we arranged it, was in
^very way a good one. Saumarez was his name, and
rummary was his nature, as a man once said. Having
drafted his Resolution, he formed a Select Committee of
One to sit upon it, and resolved to take his time. In our
unpleasant slang, the Copleigh girls 'hunted in couples.'
That is to say, you could do nothing with one without the
other. They were very loving sisters; but their mutual
affection was sometimes inconvenient. Saumarez held
the balance-hair true between them, and none but him-
self could have said to which side his heart inclined;
though every one guessed. He rode with them a good
deal and danced with them, but he never succeeded in de-
taching them from each other for any length of time.

Women said that the two girls kept together through
deep mistrust, each fearing that the other would steal a
march on her. But that has nothing to do with a man.

42 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

Saumarez was silent for good or bad, and as business-
likely attentive as he could be, having due regard for his
work and his polo. Beyond doubt both girls were fond of
him.

As the hot weather drew nearer and Saumarez made no
sign, women said that you could see their trouble in the
eyes of the girls — that they were looking strained, anxious,
and irritable. Men are quite blind in these matters un-
less they have more of the woman than the man in their
composition, in which case it does not matter what they
say or think. I maintain it was the hot April days that
took the colour out of the Copleigh girls' cheeks. They
should have been sent to the Hills early. No one — man or
woman — feels an angel when the hot weather is approach-
ing. The younger sister grew more cynical, not to say
acid, in her ways; and the winningness of the elder wore
thin. There was effort in it.

The Station wherein all these things happened was,
though not a Httle one, off the line of rail, and suffered
through want of attention. There were no gardens, or
bands or amusements worth speaking of, and it was nearly
a day's journey to come into Lahore for a[dance. People
were grateful for small things to interest them.

About the beginning of May, and just before the final
exodus of Hill-goers, when the weather was very hot and
there were not more than twenty people in the Station,
Saumarez gave a moonlight riding-picnic at an old
tomb, six miles away, near the bed of the river. It was a
'Noah's Ark' picnic; and there was to be the usual
arrangement of quarter-rrile intervals between each
couple, on account of the dust. Six couples came alto-
gether, including chaperones. Moonlight picnics are use-

FALSE DAWN 43

ful just at the very end of the season, before all the girls
go away to the Hills. They lead to understandings, and
should be encouraged by chaperones; especially those
whose girls look sweetest in riding-habits. I knew a case
once. But that is another story. That picnic was called
the ' Great Pop Picnic,' because every one knew Saumarez
would propose then to the eldest Miss Copleigh; and,
besides his affair, there was another which might possibly
come to happiness. The social atmosphere was heavily
charged and wanted clearing.

We met at the parade-ground at ten: the night was
fearfully hot. The horses sweated even at walking-
pace, but anything was better than sitting still in our
own dark houses. When we moved off under the full
moon we were four couples, one triplet, and Me. Sau-
marez rode with the Copleigh girls, and I loitered at the
tail of the procession wondering with whom Saumarez
would ride home. Every one was happy and contented;
but we all felt that things were going to happen. We
rode slowly; and it was midnight before we reached the
old tomb, facing the ruined tank, in the decayed gardens
where we were going to eat and drink. I was late in
coming up; and, before I went in to the garden, I saw
that the horizon to the north carried a faint, dun-
coloured feather. But no one would have thanked me
for spoiling so well-managed an entertainment as this
picnic — and a dust-storm, more or less, does no great
harm.

We gathered by the tank. Some one had brought
out a banjo — which is a most sentimental instrument
— and three or four of us sang. You must not laugh
at this. Our amusements in out-of-the-way Stations are

44 PLAIN TALES FROM THE fflLLS

very few indeed. Then we talked in groups or together,
lying under the trees, with the sun-baked roses drop-
ping their petals on our feet, until supper was ready.
It was a beautiful supper, as cold and as iced as you
could wish; and we stayed long over it.

I had felt that the air was growing hotter and hotter;
but nobody seemed to notice it until the moon went out
and a burning hot wind began lashing the orange-trees
with a sound like the noise of the sea. Before we knew
where we were, the dust-storm was on us and every-
thing was roaring, whirling darkness. The supper-
table was blown bodily into the tank. We were afraid
of staying anywhere near the old tomb for fear it might
fall down. So we felt our way to the orange-trees where
the horses were picketed and waited for the storm to
blow over. Then the little remaining Hght vanished,
and you could not see your hand before your face.^^ The
air was heavy with dust and sand from the bed of the river,
that filled boots and pockets and drifted down necks and
coated eyebrows and moustaches. We all huddled to-
gether close to the trembling horses, with the thunder
chattering overhead, and the lightning spurting like
water from a sluice, all ways at once. There was no
danger, of course, unless the horses broke loose. I was
standing with my head downwind and my hands
over my mouth, hearing the trees thrashing each other.
I could not see who was next me till the flashes came.
Then I found that I was packed near Saumarez and the
eldest Miss Copleigh, with my own horse just in front
of me. I recognised the eldest Miss Copleigh, because
she had a puggree round her helmet, and the younger had
not. All the electricity in the air had gone into my

FALSE DAWN 4S

body and I was quivering and tingling from head to
foot — exactly as a corn shoots and tingles before rain.
It was a grand storm. The wind seemed to be picking
up the earth and pitching it to leeward in great heaps;
and the heat beat up from the ground like the heat of
the Day of Judgment.

The storm lulled slightly after the first half-hour,
and I heard a despairing Httle voice close to my ear,
saying to itself, quietly and softly, as if some lost soul
were flying about with the wind, ^O my God!' Then
the younger Miss Copleigh stimibled into my arms,
saying, * Where is my horse? Get my horse. I want to
go home. I want to go home. Take me home.'

I thought that the Ughtning and the black darkness
had frightened her; so I said there was no danger, but
she must wait till the storm blew over. She answered,
'It is not that! I want to go home! Oh, take me away
from here!'

I said that she could not go till the light came; but
I felt her brush past me and go away. It was too dark to
see where. Then the whole sky was spHt open with one
tremendous flash, as if the end of the world were coming,
and all the women shrieked.

Almost directly after this, I felt a man's hand on
my shoulder and heard Saumarez bellowing in my ear.
Through the rattling of the trees and howling of the
wind, I did not catch his words at once, but at last I
heard him say, 'I've proposed to the wrong one! What
shall I do?' Saumarez had no occasion to make this
confidence to me. I was never a friend of his, nor am I
now; but I fancy neither of us were ourselves just then.
He was shaking as he stood with excitement, and I was

46 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

feeling queer all over with the electricity. I could not
think of anything to say except, 'More fool you for
proposing in a dust-storm.' But I did not see how that
would improve the mistake.

Then he shouted, 'Where's Edith— Edith Copleigh?'
Edith was the younger sister. I answered out of my
astonishment, 'What do you want with her?^ For
the next two minutes, he and I were shouting at
each other like maniacs, — he vowing that it was the
younger sister he had meant to propose to all along, and
I telHng him till my throat was hoarse that he must have
made a mistake! I cannot account for this except,
again, by the fact that we were neither of us ourselves.
Everything seemed to me like a bad dream — from the
stamping of the horses in the darkness to Saumarez tell-
ing me the story of his loving Edith Copleigh from the
first. He was still clawing my shoulder and begging me
to tell him where Edith Copleigh was, when another
lull came and brcught light with it, and we saw the
dust-cloud forming on the plain in front of us. So
we knew the worst was over. The moon was low down,
and there was just the glimmer of the false dawn that
comes about an hour before the real one. But the light
was very faint, and the dun cloud roared like a bull.
I wondered where Edith Copleigh had gone; and as I
was wondering I saw three things together: First, Maud
Copleigh's face come smiling out of the darkness and
move towards Saumarez who was standing by me. I
heard the girl whisper, 'George,' and slide her arm
through the arm that was not clawing my shoulder,
and I saw that look on her face which only comes once or
twice in a lifetime — when a woman is perfectly happy and

FALSE DAWN 47

the air is full of trumpets and gorgeously coloured fire
and the Earth turns into cloud because she loves and is
loved. At the same time, I saw Saumarez's face as
he heard Maud Copleigh's voice, and fifty yards away
from the clump of orange-trees, I saw a brown hoUand
habit getting upon a horse.

It must have been my state of over-excitement that
made me so ready to meddle with what did not con-
cern me. Saiunarez was moving off to the habit; but
I pushed him back and said, 'Stop here and explain.
I'll fetch her back!' And I ran out to get at my own
horse. I had a perfectly unnecessary notion that every-
thing must be done decently and in order, and that
Saumarez's first care was to wipe the happy look out
of Maud Copleigh's face. All the time I was linking
up the curb-chain I wondered how he would do it.

I cantered after Edith Copleigh, thinking to bring
her back slowly on some pretence or another. But
she galloped away as soon as she saw me, and I was
forced to ride after her in earnest. She called back
over her shoulder — 'Go away! I'm going home. Oh,
go away!' two or three times; but my business was
to catch her first, and argue later. The ride fitted
in with the rest of the evil dream. The ground was
very rough, and now and again we rushed through
the whirling, choking 'dust-devils' in the skirts of the
flying storm. There was a burning hot wind blowing
that brought up a stench of stale brick-kilns with it; and
through the half light and through the dust-devils,
across that desolate plain, flickered the brown holland
habit on the gray horse. She headed for the Station at
first. Then she wheeled round and set off for the river

48 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

♦through beds of burnt-down jungle-grass, bad even to
ride pig over. In cold blood I should never have
dreamed of going over such a country at night, but it
seemed quite right and natural with the Hghtning crack-
ling overhead, and a reek like the smell of the Pit in my
nostrils. I rode and shouted, and she bent forward
and lashed her horse, and the aftermath of the dust-
storm came up, and caught us both, and drove us down-
wind like pieces of paper.

I don't know how far we rode; but the drumming
of the horse-hoofs and the roar of the wind and the race of
the faint blood-red moon through the yellow mist seemed
to have gone on for years and years, and I was literally
drenched with sweat from my helmet to my gaiters when
the gray stumbled, recovered himself and pulled up dead
lame. My brute was used up altogether. Edith Cop-
leigh was bareheaded, plastered with dust, and crying
bitterly. * Why can't you let me alone? ' she said. ' I only
wanted to get away and go home. Oh, please let me
gor

^You have got to come back with me, Miss Copleigh.
Saumarez has something to say to you.'

It was a foolish way of putting it; but I hardly knew
Miss Copleigh, and, though I was playing Providence
at the cost of my horse, I could not tell her in as many
words what Saumarez had told me. I thought he could
do that better himseK. All her pretence about being
tired and wanting to go home broke down, and she
rocked herself to and fro in the saddle as she sobbed,
and the hot wind blew her black hair to leeward. I am
not going to repeat what she said, because she was
utterly unstrung.

FALSE DAWN 4g

This was the C5niical Miss Copleigh, and I, ahnost
an utter stranger to her, was trying to tell her that
Saumarez loved her and she was to come back to hear
him say so. I believe I made myself understood, for
she gathered the gray together and made him hobble
somehow, and we set off for the tomb, while the storm
went thundering down to Umballa and a few big drops
of warm rain fell. I found out that she had been stand-
mg close to Saumarez when he proposed to her sister,
and had wanted to go home to cry in peace, as an Eng-
lish girl should. She dabbed her eyes with her pocket-
handkerchief as we went along, and babbled to me out
of sheer lightness of heart and hysteria. That was per-
fectly unnatural; and yet, it seemed all right at the time
and in the place. All the world was only the two Cop-
leigh girls, Saumarez and I, ringed in with the Hghtning
and the dark; and the guidance of this misguided world
seemed to He in my hands.

When we returned to the tomb in the deep dead still-
ness that followed the storm, the dawn was just break-
ing and nobody had gone away. They were waiting for
our return. Saumarez most of all. His face was white
and drawn. As Miss Copleigh and I limped up, he came
forward to meet us, and, when he helped her down from
her saddle, he kissed her before all the picnic. It was
like a scene in a theatre, and the likeness was heightened
by all the dust-white, ghostly looking men and women
imder the orange-trees clapping their hands — as if they
were watching a play — at Saumarez's choice. I never
knew anything so un-English in my Hfe.

Lastly, Saumarez said we must all go home or the
Station would come out to look for us, and would I

50 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

be good enough to ride home with Maud Copleigh?
Nothing would give me greater pleasure, I said.

So we formed up, six couples in all, and went back
two by two; Saumarez walking at the side of Edith Cop-
leigh, who was riding his horse. Maud Copleigh did not
talk to me at any length.

The air was cleared; and, little by little, as the sun
rose, I felt we were all dropping back again into ordinary
men and women, and that the ' Great Pop Picnic' was a
thing altogether apart and out of the world — never to
happen again. It had gone with the dust-storm and the
tingle in the hot air.

I felt tired and Ump, and a good deal ashamed of
myself as I went in for a bath and some sleep.

There is a woman's version of this story, but it will
never be written . . . xmless Maud Copleigh caret
to try.

i

THE RESCUE OF PLUFFLES

Thus, for a season, they fought it fair —

She and his Cousin May —
Tactful, talented, debonnaire,

Decorous foes were they;
But never can battle of man compare

With merciless feminine fray.

— Two and One.

Mrs. Hauksbee was sometimes nice to her own sex.
Here is a story to prove this; and you can believe just as
much as ever you please.

Pluffles was a subaltern in the 'Unmentionables.' He
was callow, even for a subaltern. He was callow all over
— like a canary that had not finished fledging itself. The
worst of it was that he had three times as much money as
was good for him; Pluffles' Papa being a rich man and
Pluffles being the only son. Pluffles' Mamma adored
him. She was only a Kttle less callow than Pluffles, and
she beheved everything he said.

Pluffles' weakness was not believing what people said.
He preferred what he called trusting to his own judgment.
He had as much judgment as he had seat or hands; and
this preference tumbled him into trouble once or twice.
But the biggest trouble Pluffles ever manufactured came
about at Simla — some years ago, when he was four-and-
twenty.

He began by trusting to his own judgment as usual, and

51

52 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

the result was that, after a time, he was bound hand and
foot to Mrs. Reiver's 'rickshaw wheels.

There was nothing good about Mrs. Reiver, unless it
was her dress. She was bad from her hair — which started
Ufe on a Brittany girl's head — to her boot-heels, which
were two and three-eighths inches high. She was not
honestly mischievous like Mrs. Hauksbee; she was wicked
in a business-like way.

There was never any scandal — she had not generous im-
pulses enough for that. She was the exception which
proved the rule that Anglo-Indian ladies are in every way
as nice as their sisters at Home. She spent her life in
proving that rule.

Mrs. Hauksbee and she hated each other fervently.
They hated far too much to clash; but the things they
said of each other were startling — not to say original.
Mrs. Hauksbee was honest — honest as her own front-teeth
— and, but for her love of mischief, would have been a
woman's woman. There was no honesty about Mrs.
Reiver; nothing but selfishness. And at the beginmng of
the season, poor little Pluffles fell a prey to her. She laid
herself out to that end, and who was Pluffles to resist? He
trusted to his judgment, and he got judged.

I have seen Captain Hayes argue with a tough horse — I
have seen a tonga-driver coerce a stubborn pony — I have
seen a riotous setter broken to gun by a hard keeper — but
the breaking-in of Pluffles of the * Unmentionables' was
beyond all these. He learned to fetch and carry like a dog,
iind to wait like one, too, for a word from Mrs. Reiver. He
learned to keep appointments which Mrs. Reiver had no
mtention of keeping. He learned to take thankfully
dances which Mrs. Reiver had no intention of giving him.

THE RESCUE OF PLUFFLES S3

He learned to shiver for an hour and a quarter on the wind-
ward side of Elysium while Mrs. Reiver was making up her
mind to come for a ride. He learned to hunt for a 'rick'
shaw, in a light dress-suit under pelting rain, and to walk
by the side of that 'rickshaw when he had found it. He
learned what it was to be spoken to like a coolie and
ordered about like a cook. He learned all this and many
other things besides. And he paid for his schooling.

Perhaps, in some hazy way, he fancied that it was fine
and impressive, that it gave him a status among men, and
was altogether the thing to do. It was nobody's business
to warn Pluffles that he was unwise. The pace that season
was too good to inquire; and meddling with another man's
folly is always thankless work. PlufHes' Colonel should
have ordered him back to his regiment when he heard how
things were going. But Pluffles had got himself engaged
to a girl in England the last time he went Home; and, if
there was one thing more than another that the Colonel
detested, it was a married subaltern. He chuckled when
he heard of the education of Pluffles, and said it was good
training for the boy. But it was not good training in the
least. It led him into spending money beyond his means,
which were good; above that, the education spoilt an
average boy and made it a tenth-rate man of an objection-
able kind. He wandered into a bad set, and his little bill
at the jewellers was a thing to wonder at.

Then Mrs. Hauksbee rose to the occasion. She played
her game alone, knowing what people would say of her;
and she played it for the sake of a girl she had never seea
Thi^es^ fiancee was to come out, under chaperonage of an
aunt, in October, to be married to Pluffles.

At the beginning of August, Mrs. Hauksbee discovered

54 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

that it was time to interfere. A man who rides much
knows exactly what a horse is going to do next before he
does it. In the same way, a woman of Mrs. Hauksbee's
experience knows accurately how a boy will behave under
certain circumstances — notably when he is infatuated
with one of Mrs. Reiver's stamp. She said that, sooner or
later, little Pluffles would break off that engagement for
nothing at all — simply to gratify Mrs. Reiver, who, in
return, would keep him at her feet and in her service just
so long as she found it worth her while. She said she
knew the signs of these things. If she did not, no one else
could.

Then she went forth to capture Pluffles under the guns
of the enemy; just as Mrs. Cusack-Bremmil carried away
Bremmil under Mrs. Hauksbee's eyes.

This particular engagement lasted seven weeks — we
called it the Seven Weeks' War — and was fought out inch
by inch on both sides. A detailed account would fill a
book, and would be incomplete then. Any one who knows
about these things can fit in the details for himself. It
was a superb fight — there will never be another like it as
long as Jakko Hill stands— and Pluffles was the prize of
victory. People said shameful things about Mrs. Hauks-
bee. They did not know what she was playing for. Mrs.
Reiver fought partly because Pluffles was useful to her,
but mainly because she hated Mrs. Hauksbee, and the
matter was a trial of strength between them. No one
knows what Pluffles thought. He had not many ideas at
the best of times, and the few he possessed made him con-
ceited. Mrs. Hauksbee said, 'The boy must be caught;
and the only way of catching him is by treating him well.'

So she treated him as a man of the world and of ex^

THE RESCUE OF PLUFFLES SS

perience so long as the issue was doubtful. Little by little,
Pluffles fell away from his old allegiance and came over to
the enemy, by whom he was made much of. He was never
sent on out-post duty after 'rickshaws any more, nor was
he given dances which never came off, nor were the drains
on his purse continued. Mrs. Hauksbee held him on the
snafHe; and, after his treatment at Mrs. Reiver's hands,
he appreciated the change.

Mrs. Reiver had broken him of talking about himself,
and made him talk about her own merits. Mrs. Hauksbee
acted otherwise, and won his confidence, till he mentioned
his engagement to the girl at Home, speaking of it in a
high and mighty way as a piece of boyish folly. This was
when he was taking tea with her one afternoon, and dis-
coursing in what he considered a gay and fascinating
style. Mrs. Hauksbee had seen an earlier generation of
his stamp bud and blossom, and decay into fat Captains
and tubby Majors.

At a moderate estimate there were about three-and-
twenty sides to that lady's character. Some men say
more. She began to talk to PlufHes after the manner of a
mother, and as if there had been three hundred years, in-
stead of fifteen, between them. She spoke with a sort of
throaty quaver in her voice which had a soothing effect,
though what she said was anything but soothing. She
pointed out the exceeding folly, not to say meanness, of
Pluflles' conduct, and the smallness of his views. Then he
stanunered something about 'trusting to his own judg-
ment as a man of the world'; and this paved the way for
what she wanted to say next. It would have withered up
Pluffles had it come from any other woman; but, in the
soft cooing style in which Mrs. Hauksbee put it, it only

S6 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

made him feel limp and repentant — as if he had been in
some superior kind of church. Little by Httle, very softly
and pleasantly, she began taking the conceit out of
Pluffles, as they take the ribs out of an umbrella before re-
covering it. She told him what she thought of him and
his judgment and his knowledge of the world; and how his
performances had made him ridiculous to other people;
and how it was his intention to make love to herself if she
gave him the chance. Then she said that marriage would
be the making of him; and drew a pretty little picture — all
rose and opal — of the Mrs. Pluffles of the future going
through Hf e relying on the judgment and knowledge of the
world of a husband who had nothing to reproach himself
with. How she reconciled these two statements she alone
knew. But they did not strike Pluffles as conflicting.

Hers was a perfect Httle homily — much better than any
clergyman could have given — and it ended with touching
allusions to Pluffles' Mamma and Papa, and the wisdom
of taking his bride Home.

Then she sent Pluffles out for a walk, to think over
what she had said. Pluffles left, blowing his nose very
hard and holding himself very straight. Mrs. Hauksbee
laughed.

What Pluffles had intended to do in the matter of the
engagement only Mrs. Reiver knew, and she kept her own
counsel to her death. She would have Hked it spoiled as a
compHment, I fancy.

Pluffles enjoyed many talks with Mrs. Hauksbee during
the next few days. They were all to the same end, and
they helped Pluffles in the path of Virtue.

Mrs. Hauksbee wanted to keep him under her wing to
the last. Therefore she discountenanced his going down

THE RESCUE OF PLUFFLES 57

to Bombay to get married. ^ Goodness only knows what
might happen by the way!' she said. 'Pluffles is cursed
with the curse of Reuben, and India is no fit place for
himr

In the end, the fiancee arrived with her aunt; and
PlufSes, having reduced his affairs to some sort of order,
— here again Mrs. Hauskbee helped him, — was married.

Mrs. Hauksbee gave a sigh of relief when both the ' I
wills' had been said, and went her way.

Pluffles took her advice about going Home. He left the
Service and is now raising speckled cattle inside green
painted fences somewhere in England. I beheve he does
this very judiciously. He would have come to extreme
grief in India.

For these reasons, if any one says anything more than
usually nasty about Mrs. Hauksbee, tell him the story of
the Rescue of Pluffles.

CUPID'S ARROWS

Pit where the buffalo cooled his hide,

By the hot sun emptied, and blistered and dried;

Log in the plume-grass, hidden and lone;

Dam where the earth-rat's mounds are strown;

Cave in the bank where the sly stream steals;

Aloe that stabs at the belly and heels,

Jump if you dare on a steed untried —

Safer it is to go wide — go wide!

Hark, from in front where the best men ride: —

* PmU to the of, boys I Wide I Go wide 1 '

—The Peora Hunt.

Once upon a time there lived at Simla a very pretty girl,
the daughter of a poor but honest District and Sessions
Judge. She was a good girl, but could not help knowing
her power and using it. Her Mamma was very anxious
about her daughter's future, as all good Mammas should
be.

When a man is a Commissioner and a bachelor and has
the right of wearing open-work jam-tart jewels in gold
and enamel on his clothes, and of going through a door
before every one except a Member of Council, a Lieuten-
ant-Governor, or a Viceroy, he is worth marrying. At
least, that is what ladies say. There was a Commissioner
in Simla, in those days, who was, and wore, and did all I
have said. He was a plain man — an ugly man — the
ugliest man in Asia, with two exceptions. His was a face

s8

CUPID'S ARROWS 59

to dream about and try to carve on a pipe-head after-
wards. His name was Saggott — Barr-Saggott — Anthony
Barr-Saggott and six letters to follow. Departmen tally,
he was one of the best men the Government of India
owned. Socially, he was like unto a blandishing gorilla.

When he turned his attentions to Miss Beighton, I be-
lieve that Mrs. Beighton wept with deHght at the reward
Providence had sent her in her old age.

Mr. Beighton held his tongue. He was an easy-going
man.

A Commissioner is very rich. His pay is beyond the
dreams of avarice — is so enormous that he can afford to
save and scrape in a way that would almost discredit a
Member of Coimcil. Most Commissioners are mean; but
Barr-Saggott was an exception. He entertained royally;
he horsed himself well; he gave dances; he was a power in
the land; and he behaved as such.

Consider that everything I am writing of took place in
an almost pre-historic era in the history of British India.
Some folk may remember the years before lawn-tennis
was born when we aU played croquet. There were seasons
before that, if you will believe me, when even croquet had
not been invented, and archery — which was revived in
England in 1844 — was as great a pest as lawn- tennis is
now. People talked learnedly about 'holding' and 'loos-
ing,' 'steles,' 'reflexed bows,' ' 56-pound bows,' ^backed'
or 'seK-yew bows,' as we talk about 'raUies,' 'volleys,'
'smashes,' 'returns,' and 'i6-oimce rackets.'

Miss Beighton shot divinely over ladies' distance — 60
yards, that is — and was acknowledged the best lady
archer in Simla. Men caUed her 'Diana of Tara-
Devi/

6o PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

Barr-Saggott paid her great attention; and, as I have
said, the heart of her mother was uphf ted in consequence.
Kitty Beighton took matters more calmly. It was pleas-
ant to be singled out by a Commissioner with letters after
his name, and to fill the hearts of other girls with bad feel-
ings. But there was no denying the fact that Barr-Saggott
was phenomenally ugly; and all his attempts to adorn
himseK only made him more grotesque. He was not
christened 'The Langiir' — which means gray ape — for
nothing. It was pleasant, Kitty thought, to have him at
her feet, but it was better to escape from him and ride
with the graceless Cubbon — the man in a Dragoon Regi-
ment at Umballa — the boy with a handsome face, and no
prospects. Kitty liked Cubbon more than a little. He
never pretended for a moment that he was anything less
than head over heels in love with her; for he was an honest
boy. So Kitty fled, now and again, from the stately
wooings of Barr-Saggott to the company of young Cubbon,
and was scolded by her Mamma in consequence. ' But,
Mother,' she said, 'Mr. Saggott is such — such a — is so
fearfully ugly, you know!'

'My dear,' said Mrs. Beighton, piously, 'we cannot be
other than an all-ruling Providence has made us. Be-
sides, you will take precedence of your own Mother, your
know ! Think of that, and be reasonable. '

Then Kitty put up her Httle chin and said irreverent
things about precedence, and Commissioners, and matri-
mony. Mr. Beighton rubbed the top of his head; for he
was an easy-going man.

Late in the season, when he judged that the time was
ripe, Barr-Saggott developed a plan which did great
credit to his administrative powers. He arranged an

CUPID'S ARROWS 6i

archery-tournament for ladies, with a most sumptuous
diamond-studded bracelet as prize. He drew up his terms
skilfully, and every one saw that the bracelet was a gift to
Miss Beighton; the acceptance carrying with it the hand
and the heart of Commissioner Barr-Saggott. The
terms were a St. Leonard's Round — thirty-six shots
at sixty yards — under the rules of the Simla Toxophilite
Society.

All Simla was invited. There were beautifully arranged
tea-tables under the deodars at Annandale, where the
Grand Stand is now; and, alone in its glory, winking in the
sun, sat the diamond bracelet in a blue velvet case. Miss
Beighton was anxious — almost too anxious — to compete.
On the appointed afternoon all Simla rode down to
Annandale to witness the Judgment of Paris turned
upside down. Kitty rode with young Cubbon, and it
was easy to see that the boy was troubled in his mind.
He must be held innocent of everything that followed.
Kitty was pale and nervous, and looked long at the
bracelet. Barr-Saggott was gorgeously dressed, even
more nervous than ICitty, and more hideous than
ever.

Mrs. Beighton smiled condescendingly, as befitted the
mother of a potential Commissioneress, and the shooting
began; all the world standing a semicircle as the ladies
came out one after the other.

Nothing is so tedious as an archery competition. They
shot, and they shot, and they kept on shooting, till the
s}in left the valley, and little breezes got up in the deodars,
^nd people waited for Miss Beighton to shoot and win.
Cubbon was at one horn of the semicircle round the
shooters, and Barr-Saggott at the other. Miss Beighton

62 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

was last on the list. The scoring had been weak, and the
bracelet, with Commissioner Barr-Saggott, was hers to a
certainty.

The Commissioner strung her bow with his own sacred
hands. She stepped forward, looked at the bracelet, and
her first arrow went true to a hair — full into the heart of
the ^ gold ' — counting nine points.

Young Cubbon on the left turned white, and his Devil
prompted Barr-Saggott to smile. Now horses used to shy
when Barr-Saggott smiled. Kitty saw that smile. She
looked to her left-front, gave an almost imperceptible nod
to Cubbon, and went on shooting.

I wish I could describe the scene that followed. It was
out of the ordinary and most improper. Miss Kitty fitted
her arrows with immense deliberation, so that every one
might see what she was doing. She was a perfect shot;
and her 46-pound bow suited her to a nicety. She pinned
the wooden legs of the target with great care four succes-
sive times. She pinned the wooden top of the target once,
and all the ladies looked at each other. Then she began
some fancy shooting at the white, which, if you hit it,
counts exactly one point. She put five arrows into the
white. It was wonderful archery; but, seeing that her
business was to make 'golds' and win the bracelet, Barr-
Saggott turned a delicate green Hke a young water-grass.
Next, she shot over the target twice, then wide to the left
twice — always with the same deliberation — while a chilly
hush fell over the company, and Mrs. Beighton took out
her handkerchief. Then Kitty shot at the ground in front
of the target, and spHt several arrows. Then she made a
red — or seven points — ^just to show what she could do if
she liked, and she finished up her amazmg performance

CtJi>lD'S ARROWS 63

with some more fancy shooting at the target supports.
Here is her score as it was pricked off: —

Gold. Red. Blue. Black. White. '^^ ^°^|
MissBeighton i i o o 5 721

Barr-Saggott looked as if the last few arrow-heads had
been driven into his legs instead of the target's, and the
deep stillness was broken by a Uttle snubby, mottled, half-
grown girl saying in a shrill voice of triumph, ' Then Fve
won!'

Mrs. Beighton did her best to bear up; but she wept in
the presence of the people. No training could help her
through such a disappointment. Kitty unstrung her bow
with a vicious jerk, and went back to her place, while
Barr-Saggott was trying to pretend that he enjoyed
snapping the bracelet on the snubby girl's raw, red wrist.
It was an awkward scene — most awkward. Every one
tried to depart in a body and leave Kitty to the mercy of
her Mamma.

But Cubbon took her away instead, and — the rest isn't
worth printing.

HAUNTED SUBALTERNS

So long as the ' Inextingnishables ' confined themselves to
running picnics, g^nnkhanas, flirtations and innocences of
that kind, no one said anything. But when they ran
ghosts, people put up their eyebrows. 'Man can't feel
comfy with a regiment that entertains ghosts on its estab-
lishment. It is agamst General Orders. The 'Inextin-
guishables' said that the ghosts were private and not
Regimental property. They referred you to Tesser for
particulars; and Tesser told you to go to — the hottest
cantonment of all. He said that it was bad enough to
have men making hay of his bedding and breaking his
banjo-strings when he was out, without being chaffed
afterwards; and he would thank you to keep your re-
marks on ghosts to yourself. This was before the ' Inex-
tinguishables* had sworn by their several lady-loves that
they were innocent of any intrusion into Tesser's quarters.
Then Horrocks mentioned casually at Mess, that a couple
of white figures had been bounding about his room the
night before, and he didn't approve of it. The 'Inex-
tinguishables' denied, energetically, that they had had
any hand in the manifestations, and advised Horrocks to
consult Tesser.

I don't suppose that a Subaltern believes in anything
except his chances of a Company; but Horrocks and
Tesser were exceptions. They came to believe in their
ghosts. They had reason.

64

HAUNTED SUBALTERNS 6j

Horrocks used to find himself, at about three o'clock in
the morning, staring wide-awake, watching two white
Things hopping about his room and jumping up to the
ceiling. Horrocks was of a placid turn of mind. After a
week or so spent in watching his servants, and lying in
wait for strangers, and trying to keep awake all night, he
came to the conclusion that he was haunted, and that,
consequently, he need not bother. He wasn't going to en-
courage these ghosts by being frightened of them. There-
fore, when he woke — as usual — with a start and saw these
Things jumping like kangaroos, he only murmured: — * Go
on ! Don't mind me ! ' and went to sleep again.

Tesser said: — 'It's all very well for you to make fun of
your show. You can see your ghosts. Now I can't see
mine, and I don't half like it.'

Tesser used to come into his room of nights, and find
the whole of his bedding neatly stripped, as if it had been
done with one sweep of the hand, from the top right-hand
corner of the charpoy to the bottom left-hand corner.
Also his lamp used to He weltering on the floor, and
generally his pet screw-head, inlaid, nickel-plated banjo
was lying on the charpoy, with all its strings broken.
Tesser took away the strings, on the occasion of the third
manifestation, and the next night a man complimented
him on his playing the best music ever got out of a banjo,
for half an hour.

* Which half hour? ' said Tesser.

'Between nine and ten,' said the man. Tesser had
gone out to dinner at 7 :3o, and had returned at mid-
night.

He talked to his bearer and threatened him with un-
speakable things. The bearer was gray with fear:—

66 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

'I'm a poor man/ said he. ^ If the Sahib is haunted by a
Devil, what can I do? '

' Who says I'm haunted by a Devil? ' howled Tesser, for
he was angry.

*I have seen It,' said the bearer, 'at night, walking
round and round your bed ; and that is why everything
is ulta-puUa in your room. I am a poor man, but I never
go into your room alone. The bhisti comes with me.'

Tesser was thoroughly savage at this, and he spoke to
Horrocks, and the two laid traps to catch that Devil, and
threatened their servants with dog-whips if any more
* shaitan-ke-h?ii]ky-p2inky ^ took place. But the servants
were soaked with fear, and it was no use adding to their
tortures. When Tesser went out at night, four f his men,
as a rule, slept in the verandah of his quarters, until the
banjo without the strings struck up, and then they fled.

One day, Tesser had to put in a month at a Fort with a
detachment of ' Inextinguishables.' The Fort might have
been Govindghar, Jumrood, or Phillour; but it wasn't. He
left Cantonments rejoicing, for his Devil was preying on
his mind; and with him went another Subaltern, a junior.
But the Devil came too. After Tesser had been in the
Fort about ten days he went out to dinner. When he came
back he found his Subaltern doing sentry on a ban-
quette across the Fort Ditch, as far removed as might be
from the Officers' Quarters.

^What's wrong?' said Tesser.

The Subaltern said, 'Listen!' and the two, standing
under the stars, heard from the Officers' Quarters, high
up in the wall of the Fort, the 'strumty tumty tutnty*
of the banjo; which seemed to have an oratorio on hand.

'That performance,' said the Subaltern, 'has been

HAUNTED SUBALTERNS 67

going on for three mortal hours. I never wished to
desert before, but I do now. I say, Tesser, old man,
you are the best of good fellows, I'm sure, but . . - . "l >,
say . . . look here, now, you are quite unfit to live ^
with. 'Tisn't in my Commission, you know, that I'm
to serve under a . . . a . . . man with Devils.'

' Isn't it? ' said Tesser. ' If you make an ass of yourself
I'll put you under arrest . . . smdinmyroomr

^You can put me where you please, but I'm not go-
ing to assist at these infernal concerts. 'Tisn't right.
'Tisn't natural. Look here, I don't want to hurt your
feelings, but — try to think now — haven't you done
something — committed some — murder that has slipped
your memory— or forged something . . . ?'

'Weill For an all-round, double-shotted, half-baked
fool you are the . . .'

*I dare say I am,' said the Subaltern. 'But you don't
expect me to keep my wits with that row going on, do
you?'

The banjo was rattling away as if it had twenty strmgs.
Tesser sent up a stone, and a shower of broken window-
pane fell into the Fort Ditch; but the banjo kept on.
Tesser hauled the other Subaltern up to the quarters, and
lound his room in frightful confusion — lamp upset, bed-
ding all over the floor, chairs overturned, and table tilted
sideways. He took stock of the wreck and said despair-
mg: — 'Oh, this is lovely!'

The Subaltern was peeping in at the door.

*I'm glad you think so,' he said. "Tisn't lovely
enough for me. I locked up your room directly after
you had gone out. See here, I think you had better
apply for Horrocks to come out in my place. He's

66 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

troubled with your complaint, and this business will
make me a jabbering idiot if it goes on.'

Tesser went to bed amid the wreckage, very angry,
and next morning he rode into Cantonments and asked
Horrocks to arrange to reHeve ' that fool with me now/

* You've got 'em again, have you?' said Horrocks.
'So've I. Three white figures this time. We'll worry
through the entertainment together.'

So Horrocks and Tesser settled down in the Fort to^
gether, and the ' Inextinguishables' said pleasant things
about * seven other Devils.' Tesser didn't see where
the joke came in. His room was thrown upside-down
three nights out of seven. Horrocks was not troubled
In any way, so his ghosts must have been purely local
ones. Tesser, on the other hand, was personally haunted;
for his Devil had moved with liim from Cantonments
to the Fort. Those two boys spent three parts of their
time trying to find out who was responsible for the riot
in Tesser's rooms. At the end of a fortnight they tried to
find out what was responsible; and seven days later they
gave it up as a bad job. Whatever It was. It refused to
be caught; even when Tesser went out of the Fort os-
tentatiously, and Horrocks lay under Tesser's charpoy
with a revolver. The servants were afraid— more
afraid than ever— and all the evidence showed that they
had been playing no tricks. As Tesser said to Horrocks:
—'A haunted Subaltern is a joke, but s'pose this keeps
on. Just think what a haunted Colonel would be ! And
look here— s'pose I marry! D'you s'pose a girl would
Uve a week with me and this Devil?'

*I don't know,' said Horrocks. 'I haven't married
often; but I knew a woman once who lived with her

HAUNTED SUBALTERNS 69

husband when he had D. T. He's dead now, and I
dare say she would marry you if you asked her. She
isn't exactly a girl though, but she has a large experi-
ence of the other devils — the blue variety. She's a
Government pensioner now, and you might write,
y'know. Personally, if I hadn't suffered from ghosts of
my own, I should rather avoid you.'

'That's just the point,' said Tesser. 'This Devil
thing will end in getting me budnamed, and you know
I've lived on lemon-squashes and gone to bed at ten for
weeks past.'

"Tisn't that sort of Devil,' said Horrocks. 'It's
either a first-class fraud for which some one ought to
be killed, or else you've offended one of these Indian
Devils. It stands to reason that such a beastly country
should be full of fiends of all sorts.'

'But why should the creature fix on me/ said Tesser,
'and why won't he show himself and have it out like a —
like a Devil?'

They were talking outside the Mess after dark, and,
even as they spoke, they heard the banjo begin to play
in Tesser's room, about twenty yards off.

Horrocks ran to his own quarters for a shot-gun and
a revolver, and Tesser and he crept up quietly, the
banjo still playing, to Tesser's door.

'Now we've got It!' said Horrocks, as he threw the
door open and let fly with the twelve-bore; Tesser
squibbing off all six barrels into the dark, as hard as he
could pull trigger.

The furniture was ruined, and the whole Fort was
awake ; but that was aU. No one had been killed, and the
banjo was lying on the dishevelled bed-clothes as usual.

70 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

Then Tesser sat down in the verandah, and used lan-
guage that would have qualified him for the companion-
ship of unlimited Devils. Horrocks said things too; but
Tesser said the worst.

When the month in the Fort came to an end, both
Horrocks and Tesser were glad. They held a final
council of war, but came to no conclusion.

* 'Seems to me, your best plan would be to make your
Devil stretch himseK. Go down to Bombay with the
time-expired men,^ said Horrocks. ^If he really is a
Devil, he'll come in the train with you.'

**Tisn't good enough,' said Tesser. * Bombay's no
fit place to live in at this time of the year. But I'll
put in for Depot duty at the Hills.' And he did.

Now here the tale rests. The Devil stayed below,
and Tesser went up and was free. If I had invented
this story, I should have put in a satisfactory ending —
explained the manifestations as somebody's practical
joke. My business being to keep to facts, I can only
say what I have said. The Devil may have been a
hoax. If so, it was one of the best ever arranged. If
it was not a hoax . . . but you must settle that for
yourselves.

THE THREE MUSKETEERS

An' when the war began, we chased the bold Afghan,
An' we made the bloomin' Ghazi for to flee, boys 01
An' we marched mto Kaiul, an' we tuk the Balar 'Issar
An' we taught 'em to respec' the British Soldier.

— Barrack Room Ballad,

MuLVANEY, Ortheris, and Learoyd are Privates in
B Company of a Line Regiment, and personal friends
of mine. Collectively I think, but am not certain,
they are the worst men in the regiment so far as genial
blackguardism goes.

They told me this story, in the Umballa Refreshment
Room while we were waiting for an up-train. I supplied
the beer. The tale was cheap at a gallon and a half.

All men know Lord Benira Trig. He is a Duke,
or an Earl, or something unofficial; also a Peer; also a
Globe-trotter. On all three counts, as Ortheris says,
* 'e didn't deserve no consideration.' He was out in
India for three months collecting materials for a book
on ^Our Eastern Impedimenta,' and quartering himself
upon everybody, like a Cossack in evening-dress.

His particular vice — because he was a Radical, men
said — was having garrisons turned out for his inspection.
He would then dine with the Officer Commanding, and
insult him, across the Mess table, about the appearance
of the troops. That was Benira's way.

71

72 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

He turned out troops once too often. He came to
Helanthami Cantonment on a Tuesday. He wished
to go shopping in the bazars on Wednesday, and he
Mesired' the troops to be turned out on a Thursday.
On — a — Thursday. The Officer Commanding could not
well refuse; for Benira was a Lord. There was an in-
dignation-meeting of subalterns in the Mess Room, to
call the Colonel pet names.

'But the rale dimonstrashin,^ said Mulvaney, 'was
in B Comp'ny barrack; we three headin' it.'

Mulvaney climbed on to the refreshment-bar, settled
himself comfortably by the beer, and went on, 'Whin the
row was at ut's foinest an' B Comp'ny was fur goin' out
to murther this man Thrigg on the p'rade-groun', Learoyd
here takes up his helmut an' sez, — 'fwhat was ut ye said? '

'Ah said,' said Learoyd, 'gie us t' brass. Tak' oop
a subscripshun, lads, for to put off t' p'rade, an' if t'
p'rade's not put off, ah'U gie t' brass back agean. Thot's
wot ah said. All B Coomp'ny knawed me. Ah took
oop a big subscripshun — fower rupees eight annas 'twas
— an' ah went oot to turn t' job over. Mulvaney an'
Orth'ris coom with me.'

'We three raises the Divil in couples gin'rally,' ex-
plained Mulvaney.

Here Ortheris interrupted. "Ave you read the
papers? ' said he.

'Sometimes,' I said.

'We 'ad read the papers, an' we put hup a faked
decoity, a — a sedukshun.'

'^Mukshin, ye cockney,' said Mulvaney.

'^Wukshun or ^^dukshun — no great odds. Any'ow,
we arranged to talk an' put Mister Benhira out o' the

THE THREE MUSKETEERS 73

way till Thursday was hover, or 'e too busy to rux
'isself about p'raids. Hi was the man wot said, ^' We'll
make a few rupees off o' the business.'"

*We hild a Council av War,' continued Mulvaney,
*walkin' roun' by the Artill'ry Lines. I was Prisidint,
Learoyd was Minister av Finance, an' little Orth'ris

here was '

'A bloomin' Bismarck! Hi made the 'ole show pay.'
'This interferin' bit av a Benira man,' said Mulvaney,
Mid the thrick for us himself; for, on me sowl, we hadn't
a notion av what was to come afther the next minut.
He was shoppin' in the bazar on fut. 'Twas dhrawin'
dusk thin, an' we stud watchin' the Httle man hoppin' in
an' out av the shops, thryin' to injuce the naygurs to
mallum his hat. Prisintly, he sthrols up, his arrums full
av thruck, an' he sez in a consiquinshal way, shticking
out his Httle belly, ''Me good men," sez he, "have ye
seen the Kernel's b'roosh?"— "B'roosh?" sez Learoyd.
"There's no b'roosh here— nobbut a ^e^^^."— "Fwhat's
that?" sez Thrigg. Learoyd shows him wan down the
sthreet, an' he sez, "How thruly Orientil! I will ride on a
hekka.'' I saw thin that our Rigimintal Saint was for
givin' Thrigg over to us neck an' brisket. I purshued a
hekka, an' I sez to the dhriver-divil, I sez, "Ye black limb,
there's a Sahib comin' for this hekka. He wants to go
jildi to the Padsahi Jhil"— 'twas about tu moiles away
— "to shoot snipe — chirria. You dhrive Jehannum
ke marfik, mallum— Wq Hell? 'Tis no manner av use
hukkin' to the Sahib, bekaze he doesn't samjao your talk.
Av he bolos anything, just you choop and chel. Dekker?
Go arsty for the first arder-mile from cantonmints.
Thin chel, Shaitan ke marfik, an' the chooper you choops

74 I»LAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

an' the jildier you chels the better kooshy will that
Sahib be; an' here's a rupee for ye?"

*The hekka-maii knew there was somethin* out av
the common in the air. He grinned an' sez, ^'Bote
achee I I goin' damn fast." I prayed that the Kernel's
b'roosh wudn't arrive till me darUn' Benira by the
grace av God was undher weigh. The little man puts
his thruck into the hekka an' scuttles in like a fat guinea-
pig; niver offerin' us the price av a dhrink for our services
in helpin' him home. *'He's off to the Padsahi j^f/,"
sez I to the others.'

Ortheris took up the tale —

'Jist then, little Buldoo kim up, 'oo was the son of
one of the Artillery grooms — 'e would 'av made a 'evinly
newspaper-boy in London, bein' sharp an' fly to all man-
ner o' games. 'E 'ad bin watchin' us puttin' Mister Ben-
hira into 'is temporary baroush, an' 'e sez, ''What ^ave
you been a doin' of, Sahibs ? " sez 'e. Learoyd 'e caught
'im by the ear an' 'e sez — '

'Ah says,' went on Learoyd, '"Young mon, that mon's
gooin' to have t' goons out o' Thursday — to-morrow —
an' thot's more work for you, young mon. Now, sitha,
tak' a tat an' a lookri, an' ride tha domdest to t' Padsahi
Jhil. Cotch thot there hekka, and tell t' driver iv your
lingo thot you've coom to tak' his place. T' Sahib
doesn't speak t' bat, an' he's a little mon. Drive t'
hekka into t' Padsahi Jhil into t' watter. Leave t' Sahib
theer an' roon hoam; an' here's a rupee for tha.'"

Then Mulvaney and Ortheris spoke together in alter-
nate fragments: Mulvaney leading [you must pick
out the two speakers as best you can]: — 'He was a
knowin' little divil was Bhuldoo, — 'e sez bote achee an'

THE THREE MUSKETEERS 75

cuts — wid a wink in his oi — but Ei sez there's money
to be made — an' I wanted to see the ind av the cam-
paign— so Ei says we'll double hout to the Padsahi
Jhil — an' save the Uttle man from bein' dacoited by
the murtherin' Bhuldoo— an' turn hup Uke reskooers
in a Vic'oria Melodrama — so we doubled for the jhily
an' prisintly there was the divil av a hurroosh behind
us an' three bhoys on grasscuts' ponies come by, poundin'
along for the dear life— s'elp me Bob, hif Buldoo 'adn't
raised a rig'lar harmy of decoits — to do the job in shtile.
An' we ran, an' they ran, shpUttin' with laughin', till we
gets near the jhil — and 'ears sounds of distress floatin'
molloncolly on the hevenin' hair.' [Ortheris was grow-
ing poetical under the influence of the beer. The duet
recommenced: Mulvaney leading again.]

'Thin we heard Bhuldoo, the dacoit, shoutin' to the
hekka man, an' wan of the young divils brought his
stick down on the top av the hekka-cower, an' Benira
Thrigg inside howled ''Murther an' Death." Buldoo
takes the reins and dhrives like mad for the jhil, havin'
dishpersed the hekka-dtinvQi — 'oo cum up to us an' 'e
sez, sez 'e, ''That Sahib's nigh mad with funk! Wot
devil's work 'ave you led me into?"— "Hall right," sez
we, "you catch that there pony an' come along. This
Sahib's been decoited, an' we're going to resky 'im!"
Says the driver, "Decoits! Wot decoits? That's Buldoo
the budmash''— ''Bhuldoo be shot!" sez we. "'Tis a
woild dissolute Pathan frum the hills. There's about
eight av thim coerdn' the Sahib. You remimber that an'
you'll get another rupee!" Thin we heard the whop-
whop-whop av the hekka turnin' over, an' a splash av
water m' the voice av Benira Thrigg callin' upon God

76 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

to forgive his sins — an' Buldoo an' 'is friends squotterin*
in the water like boys in the Serpentine.'

Here the Three Musketeers retired simultaneously into
the beer.

'Well? What came next?' said I.

*Fwhat nex'?' answered Mulvaney, wiping his mouth.
*Wud ye let three bould sodger-bhoys lave the ornamint
av the House av Lords to be dhrowned an' dacoited in a
jhil ? We formed line av quarther-column an' we dis-
cinded upon the inimy. For the better part av ten min-
utes you could not hear yerself spake. The tattoo was
screamin' in chune wid Benira Thrigg an' Bhuldoo's
army, an' the shticks was whistlin' roun' the hekka,
an' Orth'ris was beatin' the hekka-cover wid his fistes,
an' Learoyd yellin', ''Look out for their knives!" an' me
cuttin' into the dark, right an' lef, dishpersin.' arrmy
corps av Pathans. Holy Mother av Moses! 'twas more
disp'rit than Ahmid Kheyl wid Maiwund thrown in.
Afther a while Bhuldoo an' his bhoys flees. Have ye
iver seen a rale live Lord thryin' to hide his nobility
undher a fut an' a half av brown swamp- wather? 'Tis
the Uvin' image av a water-carrier's goatskin wid the
shivers. It tuk toime to pershuade me frind Benira
he was not disimbo willed : an' more toime to get out
the hekka. The dhriver come up afther the battle,
swearin' he tuk a hand in repulsin' the inimy. Benira
was sick wid the fear. We escorted him back, very
slow, to cantonmints, for that an' the chill to soak into
him. It suk! Glory be to the Rigimintil Saint, but
it suk to the marrow av Lord Benira Thrigg!'

Here Ortheris, slowly, with immense pride — "E
sez, "You har my noble preservers," sez 'e. "You har

THE THREE MUSKETEERS 77

a honour to the British Harmy," sez 'e. With that 'e
describes the hawful band of dacoits wot set on 'im.
There was about forty of 'em an' 'e was hoverpowered
by numbers, so 'e was; but 'e never lorst 'is presence
of mind, so 'e didn't. 'E guv the A^^^a-driver five
rupees for 'is noble assistance, an' 'e said 'e would see
to us after 'e 'ad spoken to the Kernul. For we was a
honour to the Regiment, we was.'

'An' we three,' said Mulvaney, with a seraphic smile,
'have dhrawn the par-ti-cu-lar attinshin av Bobs Baha-
dur more than wanst. But he's a rale good little man
is Bobs. Go on, Orth'ris, my son.'

'Then we leaves 'im at the Kernul's 'ouse, werry
sick, an' we cuts hover to B Comp'ny barrick an' we
sez we 'ave saved Benira from a bloody doom, an' the
chances was agin there bein' p'raid on Thursday. About
ten minutes later come three enveHcks, one for each oi
us. S'elp me Bob, if the old bloke 'adn't guv us a fiver
apiece— sixty-four rupees in the bazar! On Thursday
'e was in 'orspital recoverin' from 'is sanguinary en-
counter with a gang of Pathans, an' B Comp'ny was
drinkin' 'emselves into Clink by squads. So there never
was no Thursday p'raid. But the Kernul, when 'e 'eard
of our galliant conduct, 'e sez, ''Hi know there's been
some devihy somewheres," sez 'e, "but I can't bring it
'ome to you three." '

'An' my privit imprisshin is,' said Mulvaney, getting
off the bar and turning his glass upside down, 'that,
av they had known they wudn't have brought ut home.
'Tis flyin' in the face, firstly av Nature, secon' av the
Rig'lations, an' third the will av Terence Mulvaney, to
hold p'rades av Thursdays.'

78 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

'Good, ma son!^ said Learoydj 'but, young mon,
what's t' notebook for? '

'Let be/ said Mulvaney; 'this time next month we're
in the SJterapis. 'Tis immortial fame the gentleman's
goin' to give us. But kape it dhark till we're out av the
range av me little frind Bobs Bahadur.'

And I have obeyed Mulvaney's order.

HIS CHANCE IN LIFE

Then a pile of heads he laid —
Thirty thousands heaped on high —

All to please the Kafir maid,
Where the Oxus ripples by.

Grimly spake AtuUa Elhan: —
'Love hath made this thing a Man.'

— Oatta's Story.

If you go straight away from Levees and Government
House Lists, past Trades' Balls — far beyond everything
and everybody you ever knew in your respectable Hfe
— you cross, in time, the Borderline where the last
drop of White blood ends and the full tide of Black
sets in. It would be easier to talk to a new-made
Duchess on the spur of the moment than to the Bor-
derline folk without violating some of their conventions
or hurting their feelings. The Black and the White
mix very quaintly in their ways. Sometimes the White
shows in spurts of fierce, childish pride — which is Pride
of Race run crooked — and sometimes the Black in stiU
fiercer abasement and humility, half -heathenish customs,
and strange unaccountable impulses to crime. One of
these days, this people — understand they are far lower
than the class whence Derozio, the man who imitated
Byron, sprung — will turn out a writer or a poet; and then
we shall know how they live and what they feel. In the
meantime, any stories about them cannot be absolutely
correct in fact or inference.

8o PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

Miss Vezzis came from across the Borderline to look
after some children who belonged to a lady until a
regularly ordained nurse could come out. The lady
said Miss Vezzis was a bad, dirty nurse, and inatteu;
tive. It never struck her that Miss Vezzis had her own
life to lead and her own affairs to worry over, and that
these affairs were the most important things in the
world to Miss Vezzis. Very few mistresses admit this
sort of reasoning. Miss Vezzis was as black as a boot,
and, to our standard of taste, hideously ugly. She wore
cotton-print gowns and bulged shoes; and when she lost
her temper with the children, she abused them in the
language of the Borderline — which is part EngHsh, part
Portuguese, and part Native. She was not attractive;
but she had her pride, and she preferred being called
'Miss Vezzis.'

Every Sunday, she dressed herself wonderfully and
went to see her Mamma, who lived, foi the most part, on
an old cane chair in a greasy tussur-silk dressing-gown and
a big rabbit-warren of a house full of Vezzises, Pereiras,
Ribieras, Lisboas and Gonsalveses, and a floating popula-
tion of loafers; besides fragments of the day's market,
garlic, stale incense, clothes thrown on the floor, petti-
coats hung on strings for screens, old bottles, pewter
crucifixes, dried immortelles, pariah puppies, plaster
images of the Virgin, and hats without crowns. Miss
Vezzis drew twenty rupees a month for acting as nurse,
and she squabbled weekly with her Mamma as to the per-
centage to be given towards housekeeping. When the
quarrel was over, Michele D'Cruze used to shamble
across the low mud wall of the compound and make love
to Miss Vezzis after the fashion of the Borderline, which

HIS CHANCE IN LIFE 81

is hedged about with much ceremony. Michele was a poor,
sickly weed, and very black; but he had his pride. He
would not be seen smoking a huqa for anything; and he
looked down on natives as only a man with seven-eighths
native blood in his veins can. The Vezzis Family had
their pride too. They traced their descent from a my-
thical platelayer who had worked on the Sone Bridge when
railways were new in India, and they valued their English
origin. Michele was a Telegraph Signaller on Rs. 35 a
month. The fact that he was in Government employ
made Mrs. Vezzis lenient to the shortcomings of his
ancestors.

There was a compromising legend — Dom Anna the
tailor brought it from Poonani — that a black Jew of
Cochin had once married into the D'Cruze family; while
it was an open secret that an uncle of Mrs. D'Cruze was,
at that very time, doing menial work, connected with
cooking, for a Club in Southern India! He sent Mrs.
D'Cruze seven rupees eight annas a month; but she felt
the disgrace to the family very keenly all the same.

However, in the course of a few Sundays, Mrs. Vezzis
brought herself to overlook these blemishes and gave her
consent to the marriage of her daughter with Michele, on
condition that Michele should have at least fifty rupees
a month to start married life upon. This wonderful
prudence must have been a lingering touch of the mythi-
cal platelayer's Yorkshire blood; for across the Border-
line people take a pride in marrying when they please-
not when they can.

Having regard to his departmental prospects. Miss
Vezzis might as well have asked Michele to go away and
come back with the Moon in his pocket. But Michele

$2 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS ^

was deeply in love with Miss Vezzis, and that helped him
to endure. He accompanied Miss Vezzis to Mass one
Sunday, and after Mass, walking home through the hot
stale dust with her hand in his, he swore by several Saints
whose names would not interest you, never to forget Miss
Vezzis; and she swore by her Honour and the Saints — the
oath runs rather curiously, ^In nomine Sanctissimos — '
(whatever the name of the she-Saint is) and so forth,
ending with a kiss on the forehead, a kiss on the left cheek,
and a kiss on the mouth — never to forget Michele.

Next week Michele was transferred, and Miss Vezzis
dropped tears upon the window-sash of the ' Intermedi-
ate ' compartment as he left the Station.

If you look at the telegraph-map of India you will see a
long line skirting the coast from Backergunge to Madras.
Michele was ordered to Tibasu, a little Sub-ofhce one-
third down this Hne, to send messages on from Berhampur
to Chicacola, and to think of Miss Vezzis and his chances
of getting fifty rupees a month out of office-hours. He
had the noise of the Bay of Bengal and a Bengali Babu
for company; nothing more. He sent foolish letters, with
crosses tucked inside the flaps of the envelopes, to Miss
Vezzis.

When he had been at Tibasu for nearly three weeks his
chance came.

Never forget that unless the outward and visible signs
of Our Authority are always before a native he is as in-
capable as a child of understanding what authority
means, or where is the danger of disobeying it. Tibasu
was a forgotten Httle place with a few Orissa Mohamme-
dans in it. These, hearing nothing of the CoHector-S ahib
for some time and heartily despising the Hindu Sub- Judge,

fflS CHANCE IN LIFE «3

arranged to start a little Mohurrum riot of their own.
But the Hindus turned out and broke their heads; when,
binding lawlessness pleasant, Hindus and Mohammedans
together raised an aimless sort of Donnybrook just to see
how far they could go. They looted each other's shops,
and paid off private grudges in the regular way. It was a
nasty Uttle riot, but not worth putting in the newspapers.

Michele was working in his office when he heard the
sound that a man never forgets all his life — the 'ah-yah^
of an angry crowd. [When that sound drops about three
tones, and changes to a thick, droning ui, the man who
hears it had better go away if he is alone.] The Native
Police Inspector ran in and told Michele that the town
was in an uproar and coming to wreck the Telegraph
Office. The Babu put on his cap and quietly dropped out
of the window; while the PoUce Inspector, afraid, but
obeying the old race-instinct which recognises a drop of
White blood as far as it can be diluted, said, 'What orders
does the Sahib give? '

The ' Sahib ' decided Michele. Though horribly fright-
ened, he felt that, for the hour, he, the man with the
Cochin Jew and the menial uncle in his pedigree, was the
only representative of EngHsh authority in the place.
Then he thought of Miss Vezzis and the fifty rupees, and
took the situation on himself. There were seven native
policemen in Tibasu, and four crazy smooth-bore muskets
among them. All the men were gray with fear, but not
beyond leading. Michele dropped the key of the tele-
graph instrument, and went out, at the head of his army,
to meet the mob. As the shouting crew came round a
corner of the road, he dropped and fired; the men behind
him loosing instinctively at the same time.

84 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

The whole crowd — curs to the back-bone — yelled and
;an ; leaving one man dead, and another dying in the road.
Michele was sweating with fear; but he kept his weakness
under, and went down into the town, past the house where
the Sub- Judge had barricaded himself. The streets were
empty. Tibasu was more frightened than Michele, for
the mob had been taken at the right time.

Michele returned to the Telegraph Office, and sent a
message to Chicacola asking for help. Before an answer
came, he received a deputation of the elders of Tibasu,
telHng him that the Sub- Judge said his actions generally
were ' unconstitutional,' and trying to bully him. But the
heart of Michele D'Cruze was big and white in his breast,
because of his love for Miss Vezzis the nurse-girl, and
because he had tasted for the first time Responsibility and
Success. Those two make an intoxicating drink, and have
ruined more men than ever has Whiskey. Mic}iele an-
swered that the Sub- Judge might say what he pleased, but
until the Assistant Collector came, the Telegraph
Signaller was the Government of India in Tibasu, and the
elders of the town would be held accountable for further
rioting. Then they bowed their heads and said: 'Show
mercy!' or words to that effect, and went back in great
fear; each accusing the other of having begun the rioting.

Early in the dawn, after a night's patrol with his seven
policemen, Michele went down the road, musket in hand,
to meet the Assistant Collector, who had ridden in to
quell Tibasu. But, in the presence of this young English-
man, Michele felt himself slipping back more and more
into the native; and the tale of the Tibasu Riots ended,
with the strain on the teller, in an hysterical outburst of
tears, bred by sorrow that he had killed a man, shame

fflS CHANCE IN LIFE 85

that he could not feel as uplifted as he had felt through
the night, and childish anger that his tongue could not do
justice to his great deeds. It was the White drop in
Michele's veins dying out, though he did not know it.

But the Englishman understood; and, after he had
schooled those men of Tibasu, and had conferred with the
Sub- Judge till that excellent official turned green, he
found time to draft an official letter describing the con-
duct of Michele. Which letter filtered through the Proper
Channels, and ended in the transfer of Michele up-country
once more, on the Imperial salary of sixty-six rupees a
month.

So he and Miss Vezzis were married with great state
and ancientry; and now there are several Httle D^Cruzes
sprawHng about the verandahs of the Central Telegraph
Office.

But, if the whole revenue of the Department he serves
-/ere to be his reward, Michele could never, never repeat
,7hat he did at Tibasu for the sake of Miss Vezzis the
imrse-girl.

Which proves that when a man does good work out of
all proportion to his pay, in seven cases out of nine there
is a woman at the back of the virtue.

The two exceptions must have suffered from sunstroke.

WATCHES OF THE NIGHT

What is in the Brahman's books that is in the Brahman's heart. Neither
you nor I knew there was so much evil in the world.

— Hindu Proverb.

This began in a practical joke; but it has gone far enough
now, and is getting serious.

Platte, the Subaltern, being poor, had a Waterbury
watch and a plain leather guard.

The Colonel had a Waterbury watch also, and, for
guard, the lip-strap of a curb-chain. Lip-straps make the
best watch guards. They are strong and short. Between
a lip-strap and an ordinary leather-guard there is no great
difference; between one Waterbury watch and another
none at all. Every one in the Station knew the Colonel's
lip-strap. He was not a horsey man, but he liked people
to beheve he had been one once; and he wove fantastic
stories of the hunting-bridle to which this particular lip-
T^trap had belonged. Otherwise he was painfully rehgious.

Platte and the Colonel were dressing at the Club — both
late for their engagements, and both in a hurry. That
was Kismet, The two watches were on a sheK below the
looking-glass — guards hanging down. That was careless-
ness. Platte changed first, snatched a watch, looked in
the glass, settled his tie, and ran. Forty seconds later, the
Colonel did exactly the same thing; each man taking the
pther's watch.

86

WATCHES OF THE NIGHT 87

You may have noticed that many religious people are
deeply suspicious. They seem — for purely religious
purposes, of course — to know more about iniquity
than the Unregenerate. Perhaps they were specially
bad before they became converted! At any rate, in the
imputation of things evil, and in putting the worst con-
struction on things innocent, a certain type of good people
may be trusted to surpass all others. The Colonel and his
Wife were of that type. But the Colonel's Wife was the
worst. She manufactured the Station scandal, and
— talked to her ayah. Nothing more need be said. The
Colonel's Wife broke up the Laplaces' home. The
Colonel's Wife stopped the Ferris-Haughtrey engage-
ment. The Colonel's Wife induced yoimg Buxton to
keep his wife down in the Plains through the first year
of the marriage. Wherefore little Mrs. Buxton died, and
the baby with her. These things will be remembered
against the Colonel's Wife so long as there is a regiment in
the country.

But to come back to the Colonel and Platte. They went
their several ways from the dressing-room. The Colonel
dined with two Chaplains, while Platte went to a bachelor-
party, and whist to follow.

Mark how things happen! If Platte's groom had
put the new saddle-pad on the mare, the butts of the
territs would not have worked through the worn leather
and the old pad into the mare's withers, when she was
coming home at two o'clock in the morning. She
would not have reared, bolted, fallen into a ditch, upset
the cart, and set Platte flying over an aloe-hedge on
to Mrs. Larkyn's well-kept lawn; and this tale would
never have been written. But the mare did all these

88 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

things, and while Platte was rolling over and over on
the turf, like a shot rabbit, the watch and guard flew
from his waistcoat — as an Infantry Major's sword hops
out of the scabbard when they are firing a feu-de-joie
— and rolled and rolled in the moonhght, till it stopped
under a window.

Platte stuffed his handkerchief under the pad, put
the cart straight, and went home.

Mark again how Kismet works! This would not
arrive once in a hundred years. Towards the end of
his diimer with the two Chaplains, the Colonel let out
his waistcoat and leaned over the table to look at some
Mission Reports. The bar of the watch-guard worked
through the buttonhole, and the watch — Platte's watch
— slid quietly on to the carpet. Where the bearer
found it next morning, and kept it.

Then the Colonel went home to the wife of his bosom;
but the driver of the carriage was drunk and lost his
way. So the Colonel returned at an imseemly hour,
and his excuses were not accepted. If the Colonel's
Wife had been an ordinary vessel of wrath appointed for
destruction, she would have known that when a man
stays away on purpose, his excuse is always sound and
original. The very baldness of the Colonel's explanation
proved its truth.

See once more the workings of Kismet. The Colonel's
watch, which came with Platte hurriedly on to Mrs.
Larkyn's lawn, chose to stop just under Mrs. Lark>Ti's
window, where she saw it early in the morning, recognised
it, and picked it up. She had heard the crash of Platte's
cart at two o'clock that morning, and his voice calling
the mare names. She knew Platte and liked him. That

WATCHES OF THE NIGHT 89

day she showed him the watch and heard his story.
He put his head on one side, winked and said, 'How
disgusting ! Shocking old man ! With his religious train-
ing, too ! I should send the watch to the Colonel's Wife
and ask for explanations.'

Mrs. Lark>Ti thought for a minute of the Laplaces
— whom she had known when Laplace and his wife
believed in each other — and answered, *I will send it.
I think it will do her good. But, remember, we must
never tell her the truth.'

Platte guessed that his own watch was in the ColoneFs
possession, and thought that the return of the lip-strapped
Waterbury with a soothing note from Mrs. Larkyn would
merely create a small trouble for a few minutes. Mrs.
Larkyn knew better. She knew that any poison dropped
would find good holding-ground in the heart of the Col-
onel's Wife.

The packet, and a note containing a few remarks
on the Colonel's calling-hours, were sent over to the
Colonel's Wife, who wept in her own room and took
counsel with herself.

If there was one woman under Heaven whom the
Colonel's Wife hated with holy fervour, it was Mrs.
Larkyn. Mrs. Larkyn was a frivolous lady, and called
the Colonel's Wife 'old cat.' The Colonel's Wife said
that somebody in Revelation was remarkably like
Mrs. Larkyn. She mentioned other Scripture people
as well. From the Old Testament. But the Colonel's
Wife was the only person who cared or dared to say
anything against Mrs. Larkyn. Every one else ac-
cepted her as an amusing, honest little body. Where-
fore, to believe that her husband had been shedding

Qo PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

watches under that 'Thing's^ window at ungodly hours,
coupled with the fact of his late arrival on the previous
night, was . . .

At this point she rose up and sought her husband.
He denied everything except the ownership of the
watch. She besought him, for his Soul's sake, to speak
the truth. He denied afresh, with two bad words.
Then a stony silence held the Colonel's Wife, while a
man could draw his breath five times.

The speech that followed is no affair of mine or yours.
It was made up of wifely and womanly jealousy; knowl-
edge of old age and sunk cheeks; deep mistrust born of
the text that says even little babies' hearts are as bad as
they make them; rancorous hatred of Mrs. Larkyn, and
the tenets of the creed of the Colonel's Wife's upbringing.

Over and above all, was the damning Kp-strapped
Waterbury, ticking away in the palm of her shaking,
withered hand. At that hour, I think, the Colonel's
Wife reahsed a little of the restless suspicion she had
injected into old Laplace's mind, a little of poor Miss
Haughtrey's misery, and some of the canker that ate
into Buxton's heart as he watched his wife dying before
his eyes. The Colonel stammered and tried to explain.
Then he remembered that his watch had disappeared;
and the mystery grew greater. The Colonel's Wife
talked and prayed by turns till she was tired, and went
away to devise means for chastening the stubborn heart
of her husband. Which, translated, means, in our
slang, Hail- twisting.'

Being deeply impressed with the doctrine of Original
Sin, she could not believe in the face of appearances. She
knew too much, and jumped to the wildest conclusions.

WATCHES OF THE NIGHT 91

But it was good for her. It spoilt her life, as she
had spoilt the life of the Laplaces. She had lost her
faith in the Colonel, and— here the creed-suspicion
came in— he might, she argued, have erred many times,
before a merciful Providence, at the hands of so un-
worthy an instrument as Mrs. Larkyn, had established
his guilt. He was a bad, wicked, gray-haired profligate.
This may sound too sudden a revulsion for a long-
wedded wife; but it is a venerable fact that, if a man
or woman makes a practice of, and takes a delight in,
believmg and spreading evil of people indifferent to
him or her, he or she will end in beheving evil of folk
very near and dear. You may think, also, that the
mere incident of the watch was too small and trivial
to raise this misunderstanding. It is another aged
fact that, in life as well as racing, all the worst accidents
happen at little ditches and cut-down fences. In the
same way, you sometimes see a woman who would
have made a Joan of Arc in another century and climate,
threshing herself to pieces over all the mean worry of
housekeeping. But that is another story.

Her belief only made the Colonel's Wife more wretched,
because it insisted so strongly on the villainy of men.
Remembering what she had done, it was pleasant to
watch her unhappiness, and the penny-farthing attempts
she made to hide it from the Station. But the Station
knew and laughed heartlessly; for they had heard the
story of the watch, with much dramatic gesture, from
Mrs. Larkyn' s lips.

Once or twice Platte said to Mrs. Larkyn, seeing
that the Colonel had not cleared himself, 'This thing
has gone far enough. I move we tell the Colonel's

93 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

Wife how it happened.' Mrs. Larkyn shut her lips
and shook her head, and vowed that the Colonel's Wife
must bear her punishment as best she could. Now
Mrs. Larkyn was a frivolous woman, in whom none
would have suspected deep hate. So Platte took no
action, and came to believe gradually, from the Colonel's
silence, that the Colonel must have run off the line some-
where that night, and, therefore, preferred to stand
sentence on the lesser count of rambling into other
people's compounds out of calling-hours. Platte for-
got about the watch business after a while, and moved
down-country with his regiment. Mrs. Larkyn went
home when her husband's tour of Indian service expired.
She never forgot.

But Platte was quite right when he said that the
joke had gone too far. The mistrust and the tragedy
of it — ^which we outsiders cannot see and do not believe
in — are killing the Colonel's Wife, and are making the
Colonel wretched. If either of them read this story,
they can depend upon its being a fairly true account of
the case, and can kiss and make friends.

Shakespeare alludes to the pleasure of watching an
Engineer being shelled by his own Battery. Now this
shows that poets should not write about what they do
not understand. Any one could have told him that
Sappers and Gunners are perfectly different branches
of the Service. But, if you correct the sentence, and
substitute Gunner for Sapper, the moral comes just the
same.

THE OTHER MAN

When the Earth was sick and the Skies were gray

And the woods were rotted with rain,

The Dead Man rode through the autumn day

To visit his love again.

—Old Ballad.

Far back in the ^seventies,' before they had built any
PubHc-Offices at Simla, and the broad road round Jakkc
lived in a pigeon-hole in the P. W. D. hovels, her parents
made Miss Gaurey marry Colonel Schreiderling. He
could not have been much more than thirty-five years
her senior; and, as he lived on two hundred rupees a
month and had money of his own, he was well off. He
belonged to good people, and suffered in the cold weather
from lung-complaints. In the hot weather he dangled on
the brink of heat-apoplexy; but it never quite killed him.
Understand, I do not blame Schreiderling. He was
a good husband according to his Hghts, and his temper
only failed him when he was being nursed. Which
was some seventeen days in each month. He was
almost generous to his wife about money-matters, and
that, for him, was a concession. Still Mrs. Schreiderhng
was not happy. They married her when she was this
side of twenty and had given all her poor Httle heart
to another man. I have forgotten his name, but we
will call him the Other Man. He had no money and

93

94 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

no prospects. He was not even good-looking; and I
think he was in the Commissariat or Transport. But,
in spite of all these things, she loved him very badly;
and there was some sort of an engagement between the
two when SchreiderHng appeared and told Mrs. Gaurey
that he wished to marry her daughter. Then the other
engagement was broken off — washed away by Mrs.
Gaurey's tears, for that lady governed her house by
weeping over disobedience to her authority and the
lack of reverence she received in her old age. The
daughter did not take after her mother. She never cried.
Not even at the wedding.

The Other Man bore his loss quietly, and was trans-
ferred to as bad a station as he could find. Perhaps
the climate consoled him. He suffered from inter-
mittent fever, and that may have distracted him from
his other trouble. He was weak about the heart also.
Both ways. One of the valves was affected, and the
fever made it worse. This showed itself later on.

Then many months passed, and Mrs. SchreiderHng
took to being ill. She did not pine away like people
in story-books, but she seemed to pick up every form
of illness that went about a Station, from simple fever
upwards. She was never more than ordinarily pretty
at the best of times; and the illnesses made her ugly.
SchreiderHng said so. He prided himself on speaking
his mind.

When she ceased being pretty, he left her to her own
devices, and went back to the lairs of his bachelordom.
She used to trot up and down Simla Mall in a forlorn
sort of way, with a gray Terai hat well on the back of
her head, and a shocking bad saddle under her. Schrei-

THE OTHER MAN 95

Herling's generosity stopped at the horse. He said that
any saddle would do for a woman as nervous as Mrs.
Schreiderling. She never was asked to dance, because
she did not dance well; and she was so dull and uninter-
esting that her box very seldom had any cards in it.
Schreiderling said that if he had known she was going
to be such a scarecrow after her marriage, he would never
have married her. He always prided himself on speaking
his mind, did Schreiderling.

He left her at Simla one August, and went down to his
regiment. Then she revived a httle, but she never re-
covered her looks. I found out at the Club that the
Other Man was coming up sick— very sick — on an off
chance of recovery. The fever and the heart-valves
had nearly killed him. She knew that too, and she
knew— what I had no interest in knowing— when he was
coming up. I suppose he wrote to tell her. They had
not seen each other since a month before the wedding.
And here comes the unpleasant part of the story.

A late call kept me down at the Dovedell Hotel till dusk
one evening. Mrs. Schreiderling had been flitting up and
down the Mall all the afternoon in the rain. Coming up
along the Cart-road, a tonga passed me, and my pony,
tired with standing so long, set off at a canter. Just by
the road down to the Tonga Office Mrs. Schreiderling,
dripping from head to foot, was waiting for the tonga.^ I
turned uphill as the tonga was no affair of mine; and just
then she began to shriek. I went back at once and saw,
under the Tonga Office lamps, Mrs. Schreiderling kneel-
ing in the wet road by the back seat of the newly arrived
tonga, screaming hideously. Then she fell face down in
the dirt as I came up.

r/j I>LA1N TALES fROM THE HILLS

Sitting in the back seat, very square and firm, with one
hand on the awning-stanchion and the wet pouring off his
hat and moustache, was the Other Man — dead. The
sixty-mile uphill jolt had been too much for his valve, I
suppose. The tonga-driver said, 'This Sahib died two
stages out of Solon. Therefore, I tied him with a rope,
lest he should fall out by the way, and so came to Simla.
Will the Sahib give me hukshish? It' pointing to the
Other Man, ' should have given one rupee.'

The Other Man sat with a grin on his face, as if he
enjoyed the joke of his arrival; and Mrs. Schreiderling, in
the mud, began to groan. There was no one except us
four in the office and it was raining heavily. The first
thing was to take Mrs. Schreiderling home, ^and the
second was to prevent her name from being mixed up with
the affair. The tonga-driver received five rupees to find a
bazar 'rickshaw for Mrs. Schreiderling. He was to tell the
Tonga Babu afterwards of the Other Man, and the Babu
was to make such arrangements as seemed best.

Mrs. Schreiderhng was carried to the shed out of the
rain, and for three-quarters of an hour we two waited for
the 'rickshaw. The Other Man was left exactly as he had
arrived. Mrs. Schreiderling would do everything but cry,
which might have helped her. She tried to scream as soon
as her senses came back, and then she began praying for
the Other Man's soul. Had she not been as honest as the
day she would have prayed for her own soul too. I
waited to hear her do this, but she did not. Then I tried
to get some of the mud off her habit. Lastly, the 'rick-
shaw came, and I got her away — partly by force. It was
a terrible business from beginning to end; but most of all
when the 'rickshaw had to squeeze between the wall and

THE OTHER MAN 97

the tonga, and she saw by the lamplight that thin, yellow
hand grasping the awning-stanchion.

She was taken home just as every one was going to a
dance at Viceregal Lodge — ^ Peterhoff ' it was then — and
the doctor found out that she had fallen from her horse,
that I had picked her up at the back of Jakko, and really
deserved great credit for the prompt manner in which I
had secured medical aid. She did not die — men of
Schreiderling's stamp marry women who don't die easily.
They live and grow ugly.

She never told of her one meeting, since her marriage^
with the Other Man; and, when the chill and cough follow-
ing the exposure of that evening allowed her abroad, she
never by word or sign alluded to having met me by the
Tonga Office. Perhaps she never knew.

She used to trot up and down the Mall, on that shock-
ing bad saddle, looking as if she expected to meet some
one round the corner every minute. Two years after-
wards she went Home, and died — at Bournemouth, I
think.

Schreiderling, when he grew maudlin at mess, used to
talk about 'my poor dear wife.' He always set great
store on speaking his mind, did Schreiderling.

CONSEQUENCES

Rosicrucian subtleties

In the Orient had rise;

Ye may find their teachers still

Under Jactala's Hill.

Seek ye Bombast Paracelsus,

Read what Flood the Seeker tells us

Of the Dominant that runs

Through the Cycles of the Suns —

Read my story last, and see

Luna at her apogee.

There are yearly appointments, and two-yearly appoint-
ments, and five-yearly appointments at Simla, and there
are, or used to be, permanent appointments, whereon you
stayed up for the term of your natural life and secured red
cheeks and a nice income. Of course, you could descend
in the cold weather; for Simla is rather dull then.

Tarrion came from goodness knows where — all away
and away in some forsaken part of Central India, where
they call Pachmari a Sanitarium, and drive behind trot-
ting-bullocks, I believe. He belonged to a regiment; but
what he really wanted to do was to escape from his regi-
ment and live in Simla for ever and ever. He had no
preference for anything in particular, beyond a good
horse and a nice partner. He thought he could do every-
thing well; which is a beautiful belief when you hold it
with all your heart. He was clever in many ways, and

98

CONSEQUENCES 99

good to look at, and always made people round him com-
fortable— even in Central India.

So he went up to Simla, and, because he was clever and
amusing, he gravitated naturally to Mrs. Hauksbee, who
could forgive everything but stupidity. Once he did her a
great service by changing the date on an invitation-card
for a big dance which Mrs. Hauksbee wished to attend,
but couldn't because she had quarrelled with the A.-D.-
C, who took care, being a mean man, to invite her to a
small dance on the 6th instead of the big Ball of the 26th.
It was a very clever piece of forgery; and when Mrs.
Hauksbee showed the A.-D.-C. her invitation-card, and
chaffed him mildly for not better managing his vendettas,
he really thought that he had made a mistake; and —
which was wise — reahsed that it was no use to fight with
Mrs. Hauksbee. She was grateful to Tarrion and asked
what she could do for him. He said simply, * I'm a Free-
lance up here on leave, on the lookout for what I can loot.
I haven't a square inch of interest in all Simla. My name
isn't known to any man with an appointment in his gift,
and I want an appointment — a good, sound one. I be-
lieve you can do anything you turn yourself to. Will you
help me?' Mrs. Hauksbee thought for a minute, and
passed the lash of her riding-whip through her lips, as was
her custom when thinking. Then her eyes sparkled and
she said, 'I will'; and she shook hands on it. Tarrion,
having perfect confidence in this great woman, took no
further thought of the business at all. Except to wonder
what sort of an appointment he would win.

Mrs. Hauksbee began calculating the prices of all the
Heads of Departments and Members of Council she knew,
and the more she thought the more she laughed, because

joo PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

her heart was in the game and it amused her. Then she
took a Civil List and ran over a few of the appointments.
There are some beautiful appointments in the Civil List.
Eventually, she decided that, though Tarrion was too
good for the PoKtical Department, she had better begin
by trying to place him there. Her own plans to this end
do not matter in the least, for Luck or Fate played into
her hands, and she had nothing to do but to watch the
course of events and take the credit of them.

All Viceroys, when they first come out, pass through
the Diplomatic Secrecy craze. It wears off in time; but
they all catch it in the beginning, because they are new to
the country. The particular Viceroy who was suffering
from the complaint just then — this was a long time ago,
before Lord Dufferin ever came from Canada, or Lord
Ripon from the bosom of the EngHsh Church — had it
very badly; and the result was that men who were new to
keeping official secrets went about looking unhappy; and
the Viceroy plmned himself on the way in which he had
instilled notions of reticence into his Staff.

Now, the Supreme Government have a careless custom
of committing what they do to printed papers. These
papers deal with all sorts of things — from the payment of
Rs. 200 to a 'secret service' native, up to rebukes ad-
ministered to Vakils and Motamids of Native States, and
rather brusque letters to Native Princes, telling them to
put their houses in order, to refrain from kidnappng
women, or filling offenders with pounded red pepper, and
eccentricities of that kind. Of course, these things could
never be made pubHc, because Native Princes never err
officially, and their States are officially as well admin-
istered as Our territories. Also, the private allowances

CONSEQC'ENCES loi

to various queer people are not exactly matters to put
into newspapers, though they give quaint reading some-
times. When the Supreme Government is at Simla, these
papers are prepared there, and go round to the people
who ought to see them in office-boxes or by post. The
principle of secrecy was to that Viceroy quite as impor-
tant as the practice, and he held that a benevolent
despotism like Ours should never allow even little things,
such as appointments of subordinate clerks, to leak out
till the proper time. He was always remarkable for his
principles.

There was a very important batch of papers in prep-
aration at that time. It had to travel from one end of
Simla to the other by hand. It was not put into an official
envelope, but a large, square, pale pink one; the matter
being in MS. on soft crinkly paper. It was addressed to
'The Head Clerk, etc. etc' Now, between 'The Head
Clerk, etc. etc' and 'Mrs. Hauksbee' and a flourish, is no
very great difference, if the address be written in a very
bad hand, as this was. The orderly who took the envelope
was not more of an idiot than most orderlies. He merely
forgotwhere this most unofficial coverwas to be delivered,
and so asked the first Englishman he met, who happened
to be a man riding down to Annandale in a great hurry.
The Englishman hardly looked at it, said, 'Mrs. Hauks-
bee,' and went on. So did the orderly, because that letter
was the last in stock and he wanted to get his work over.
There was no book to sign; he thrust the letter into Mrs.
Hauksbee's bearer's hands and went off to smoke with a
friend. Mrs. Hauksbee was expecting some cut-out
pattern things in flimsy paper from a friend. As soon as
she got the big square packet, therefore, she said, 'Oh, the

102 PLAIN TM.ES FROM THE HILLS

»lear creature!' and tore it open with a paper-knife, and
?J1 the MS. enclosures tumbled out on the floor.

Mrs. Hauksbee began reading. I have said the batch
was rather important. That is quite enough for you to
know. It referred to some correspondence, two measures,
a peremptory order to a native chief, and two dozen other
things. Mrs. Hauksbee gasped as she read, for the first
gHmpse of the naked machinery of the Great Indian
Government, stripped of its casings, and lacquer, and
paint, and guard-rails, impresses even the most stupid
man. And Mrs. Hauksbee was a clever woman. She was
a httle afraid at first, and felt as if she had taken hold of a
lightning-flash by the tail, and did not quite know what
to do with it. There were remarks and initials at the side
of the papers; and some of the remarks were rather more
severe than the papers. The initials belonged to men who
are all dead or gone now; but they were great in their day.
Mrs. Hauksbee read on and thought calmly as she read.
Then the value of her trove struck her, and she cast about
for the best method of using it. Then Tarrion dropped in,
and they read through all the papers together, and Tar-
rion, not knowing how she had come by them, vowed that
Mrs. Hftuksbee was the greatest woman on earth. Which
I believe was true, or nearly so.

'The honest course is always the best,' said Tarrion,
after an hour and a half of study and conversation.
*A11 things considered, the Intelligence Branch is about
my form. Either that or the Foreign Office. I go to
lay siege to the High Gods in their Temples.'

He did not seek a Httle man, or a little big man, or a
weak Head of a strong Department, but he called on
the biggest and strongest man that the Government

CONSEQUENCES 103

owned, and explained that he wanted an appointment
at Simla on a good salary. The compound insolence of
this amused the Strong Man, and, as he had nothing to
do for the moment, he listened to the proposals of the
audacious Tarrion. 'You have, I presume, some special
qualifications, besides the gift of self-assertion, for the
claims you put forward?' said the Strong Man. 'That,
Sir,' said Tarrion, 'is for you to judge.' Then he began,
for he had a good memory, quoting a few of the more
important notes in the papers — slowly and one by one as
a man drops chlorodyne into a glass. When he had
reached the peremptory order — and it was a very per-
emptory order — the Strong Man was troubled. Tar-
rion wound up — 'And I fancy that special knowledge of
this kind is at least as valuable for, let us say, a berth in
the Foreign Office, as the fact of being the nephew of a
distinguished officer's wife.' That hit the Strong Man
hard, for the last appointment to the Foreign Office had
been by black favour, and he knew it.

'I'll see what I can do for you,' said the Strong Man.

'Many thanks,' said Tarrion. Then he left, and
the Strong Man departed to see how the appointment
was to be blocked.

Followed a pause of eleven days; with thunders
and lightnings and much telegraphing. The appoint-
ment was not a very important one, carrying only
between Rs.500 and Rs.700 a month; but, as the Vice-
roy said, it was the principle of diplomatic secrecy that
had to be maintained, and it was more than likely that a
boy so well supplied with special information would be

104 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS j

worth translating. So they translated Tarrion. They
must have suspected him, though he protested that his
information was due to singular talents of his own. Now,
much of this story, including the after-history of the
missing envelope, you must fill in for yourself, because
there are reasons why it cannot be written. If you do
not know about things Up Above, you won't understand
how to fill in, and you will say it is impossible.

What the Viceroy said when Tarrion was intro-
duced to him was — 'This is the boy who *' rushed" the
Government of India, is it? Recollect, Sir, that is not
done twice.' So he must have known something.

What Tarrion said when he saw his appointment
gazetted was — *If Mrs. Hauksbee were twenty years
younger, and I her husband, I should be Viceroy of
India in fifteen years.'

What Mrs. Hauksbee said, when Tarrion thanked
her, almost with tears in his eyes, was first — *I told
you so!' and next, to herseK — 'What fools men areT

I

THE CONVERSION OF AURELIAN McGOGGIN

Ride with an idle whip, ride with an unused heel,
But, once in a way, there will come a day
When the colt must be taught to feel
The lash that falls, and the curb that galls, and the sting of the rowelled
steel.

— Life's Handicap.

This is not a tale exactly. It is a Tract; and I am im-
mensely proud of it. Making a Tract is a Feat.

Every man is entitled to his own religious opinions;
but no man — least of all a junior — has a right to thrust
these down other men's throats. The Government
sends out weird Civilians now and again; but McGoggin
was the queerest exported for a long time. He was
clever — brilliantly clever — but his cleverness worked the
wrong way. Instead of keeping to the study of the
vernaculars, he had read some books written by a man
called Comte, I think, and a man called Spencer. [You
will find these books in the Library.] They deal with
people's insides from the point of view of men who have
no stomachs. There was no order against his reading
them; but his Mamma should have smacked him. They
fermented in his head, and he came out to India with a
rarefied religion over and above his work. It was not
much of a creed. It only proved that men had no souls,
and there was no God and no hereafter, and that you
must worry along somehow for the good of Humanity.

los

io5 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

One of its minor tenets seemed to be that the one
thing more sinful than giving an order was obeying it.
At least, that was what McGoggin said; but I suspect
he had misread his primers.

I do not say a word against this creed. It was made
up in Town where there is nothing but machinery and
asphalte and building — all shut in by the fog. Natu-
rally, a man grows to think that there is no one higher
than himself, and that the Metropolitan Board of Works
made everything. But in India, where you really see
humanity — raw, brown, naked hmnanity — with nothing
between it and the blazing sky, and only the used-up,
over-handled earth underfoot, the notion somehow dies
away, and most folk come back to simpler theories.
Life, in India, is not long enough to waste in proving that
there is no one in particular at the head of affairs. For
this reason. The Deputy is above the Assistant, the
Commissioner above the Deputy, the Lieutenant-
Governor above the Commissioner, and the Viceroy
above all four, under the orders of the Secretary of State
who is responsible to the Empress. If the Empress be
not responsible to her Maker — if there is no Maker for
her to be responsible to — the entire system of Our ad'
ministration must be wrong. Which is manifestly im-
possible. At Home men are to be excused. They are
stalled up a good deal and grow intellectually 'beany.'
When you take a gross, * beany' horse to exercise, he
slavers and slobbers over the bit till you can't see the
horns. But the bit is there just the same. Men do not
get 'beany' in India. The climate and the work are
against playing bricks with words.

If McGoggin had kept his creed, with the capital

THE CONVERSION OF AURELIAN McGOGGIN 107

letters and the endings in 'isms/ to himself, no one
would have cared; but his grandfathers on both sides
had been Wesleyan preachers, and the preaching strain
came out in his mind. He wanted every one at the
Club to see that they had no souls too, and to help him
to eliminate his Creator. As a good many men told
him, he undoubtedly had no soul, because he was sci
young, but it did not follow that his seniors were equally
undeveloped; and, whether there was another world or
not, a man still wanted to read his papers in this. * But
that is not the point — that is not the point!' AureHan
used to say. Then men threw sofa-cushions at him and
told him to go to any particular place he might believe
in. They christened him the * Blastoderm,' — he said he
came from a family of that name somewhere, in the pre-
historic ages, — and, by insult and laughter strove to
choke him dumb, for he was an unmitigated nuisance
at the Club; besides being an offence to the older men.
His Deputy Commissioner, who was working on the
Frontier when AureHan was rolling on a bed-quilt, told
him that, for a clever boy, Aurelian was a very big idiot.
And, if he had gone on with his work, he would have been
caught up to the Secretariat in a few years. He was
of the type that goes there — all head, no physique and
a hundred theories. Not a soul was interested in McGog-
gin's soul. He might have had two, or none, or some-
body else's. His business was to obey orders and keep
abreast of his files, instead of devastating the Club with
^isms.'

He worked brilliantly; but he could not accept any
order without trying to better it. That was the fault
of his creed. It made men too responsible and left too

io8 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

much to their honour. You can sometimes ride an old
horse in a halter; but never a colt. McGoggin took
more trouble over his cases than any of the men of his
year. He may have fancied that thirty-page judgments
on fifty-rupee cases — both sides perjured to the gullet
— advanced the cause of Humanity. At any rate, he
worked too much, and worried and fretted over the re-
bukes he received, and lectured away on his ridiculous
creed out of office, till the Doctor had to warn him that
he was overdoing it. No man can toil eighteen annas
in the rupee in June without suffering. But McGoggin
was still intellectually 'beany* and proud of himself and
his powers, and he would take no hint. He worked nine
hours a day steadily.

^Very well,' said the Doctor, 'you'll break down, be-
cause you are over-engined for your beam.' McGoggin
was a Httle man.

One day, the collapse came — as dramatically as if
it had been meant to embellish a Tract.

It was just before the Rains. We were sitting in
the verandah in the dead, hot, close air, gasping and
praying that the black-blue clouds would let down and
bring the cool. Very, very far away, there was a faint
whisper, which was the roar of the Rains breaking
over the river. One of the men heard it, got out of
his chair, listened and said, naturally enough, 'Thank
God!'

Then the Blastoderm turned in his place and said,
* Why? I assure you it's only the result of perfectly
natural causes — atmospheric phenomena of the simplest
kind. Why you should, therefore, return thanks to a
Being who never did exist — who is only a figment '

THE CONVERSION OF AURELIAN McGOGGIN 109

'Blastoderm/ grunted the man in the next chah*,
*dry up, and throw me over the Pioneer, We know all
about your figments.' The Blastoderm reached out to
the table, took up one paper, and jumped as if some-
thing had stung him. Then he handed the paper.

^As I was saying,* he went on slowly and with an
effort — 'due to perfectly natural causes — perfectly nat-
ural causes. I mean '

'Hi! Blastoderm, you've given me the Calcutta
Mercantile Advertiser.^

The dust got up in little whorls, while the tree-tops
rocked and the kites whistled. But no one was looking
at the coming of the Rains. We were all staring at
the Blastoderm, who had risen from his chair and was
fighting with his speech. Then he said, still more
slowly —

'Perfectly conceivable dictionary red oak

amenable cause retaining shuttle-cock

alone.'

'Blastoderm's drunk,' said one man. But the Blas-
toderm was not drunk. He looked at us in a dazed
sort of way, and began motioning with his hands in the
half Hght as the clouds closed overhead. Then — with
a scream —

'What is it? Can't reserve attainable

market obscure '

But his speech seemed to freeze in him, and — just as
the Hghtning shot two tongues that cut the whole sky
into three pieces and the rain fell in quivering sheets^
the Blastoderm was struck dumb. He stood pawing
and champing like a hard-held horse, and his eyes were
full of terror.

no PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

The Doctor came over in three minutes, and heard
the story. 'It's aphasia,^ he said. 'Take him to his
room. I knew the smash would come.' We carried
the Blastoderm across in the pouring rain to his quar-
ters, and the Doctor gave him bromide of potassium to
make him sleep.

Then the Doctor came back to us and told us that
aphasia was like all the arrears of 'Punjab Head' falling
in a lump; and that only once before — in the case of a
sepoy — had he met with so complete a case. I have
seen mild aphasia in an overworked man, but this suddeii
dumbness was uncanny — though, as the Blastoderm him-
self might have said, due to 'perfectly natural causes.'

'He'll have to take leave after this,' said the Doctor.
*He won't be fit for work for another three months. No;
it isn't insanity, or anything like it. It's only complete
loss of control over the speech and memory- I fancy vt
will keep the Blastoderm quiet, though.'

Two days later, the Blastoderm found his tongue again.
The first question he asked was — ' What was it? ' The
Doctor enUghtened him. 'But I can't understand it!'
said the Blastoderm. ' I'm quite sane; but I can't be sure
of my mind, it seems — my own memory — can I ? '

' Go up into the Hills for three months, and don't think
about it,' said the Doctor.

'But I can't understand it,' repeated the Blastoderm.
^It was my own mind and memory.'

'I can't help it,' said the Doctor; 'there are a good
many things you can't understand; and, by the time you
have put in my length of service, you'll know exactly how
much a man dare call his own in this world.'

The stroke cowed the Blastoderm. He could not

THE CONVERSION OF AURELIAN McGOGGIN iii

understand it. He went into the Hills in fear and trem-
biing, wondering whether he would be permitted to reach
the end of any sentence he began.

This gave him a wholesome feeling of mistrust. The
legitimate explanation, that he had been overworking
himself, failed to satisfy him. Something had wiped his
lips of speech, as a mother wipes the milky lips of her
child, and he was afraid — horribly afraid.

So the Club had rest when he returned; and if ever you
come across AureHan McGoggin laying down the law on
things Human — he doesn't seem to know as much as he
used to about things Divine — put your forefinger to your
lip for a moment, and see what happens.

"Oon't blame me if he throws a glass at your head.

I

THE TAKING OF LUNGTUNGPEI^

So we loosed a bloomin' volley,
An' we made the beggars cut.
An' when our pouch was emptied out,
We used the bloomin' butt,
Ho! My!

Don't yer come anigh,
When Tommy is a playin' with the baynit an' the butt.

— Barrack Room Ballad.

My friend Private Mulvaney told me this, sitting on the
parapet of the road to Dagshai, when we were hunting
butterflies together. He had theories about the Army,
and coloured clay pipes perfectly. He said that the young
soldier is the best to work with, 'on account av the sur-
passing innocinse av the child.'

'Now, listen!' said Mulvaney, throwing himself full
length on the wall in the sun. ' I'm a bom scutt av the
barrack-room! The Army's mate an' dhrink to me,
bekaze I'm wan av the few that can't quit ut. I've put in
sivinteen years, an' the pipeclay's in the marrow av me.
Av I cud have kept out av wan big dhrink a month, I wud
have been a Hon'ry Lift'nint by this time — a nuisance to
my betthers, a laughin'-shtock to my equils, an' a curse to
meself. Bein' fwhat I am, I'm Privit Mulvaney, wid no
good-conduc' pay an' a devourin' thirst. Always barrin'
me little frind Bobs Bahadur, I know as much about the
Army as most men.'

THE TAKING OF LUNGTUNGPEN 113

I said something here.

' Wolseley be shot ! Betune you an' me an' that butter-
fly net, he's a ramblin', incoherint sort av a divil, wid wan
oi on the Quane an' the Coort, an' the other on his blessed
silf — everlastin'ly playing Saysar an' Alexandrier rowled
into a lump. Now Bobs is a sinsible^Httle man. Wid Bobs
an' a few three-year-olds, I'd swape any army av the earth
into a towel, an' throw it away aftherwards. Faith, I'm
not jokin'! 'Tis the bhoys — the raw bhoys — that don't
know fwhat a bullut manes, an' wudn't care av they did—
that dhu the work. They're crammed wid bull-mate till
they fairly ramps wad good Hvin' ; and thin, av they don't
fight, they blow each other's bids off. 'Tis the trut' I'm
telhn' you. They shud be kept on water an' rice in the
hot weather; but there'd be a mut'ny av 'twas done.

'Did ye iver hear how Privit Mulvaney tuk the towa
av Lungtungpen? I thought not! 'Twas the Lift'nint
got the credit; but 'tw^as me planned the schame. A Httle
before I was inviladed from Burma, me an' four-an'-
twenty yoimg wans undher a Lift'nint Brazenose, was
ruinin' our dijeshins thryin' to catch dacoits. An' such
double-ended divils I niver knew I 'Tis only a dah an' a
Snider that makes a dacoit. Widout thim, he's a paceful
cultivator, an' felony for to shoot. We hunted, an' we
hunted, an' tuk fever an' elephints now an' again; but no
dacoits. Evenshually, we puckarowed wan man. '' Trate
him tinderly," sez the Lift'nint. So I tuk him away into
the jungle, wid the Burmese Interprut'r an' my clanin'-
rod. Sez I to the man, "My paceful squireen," sez I,
"you shquot on your hunkers an' dimonstrate to my frind
here, where your frinds are whin they're at home? ' Wid
that I introjuced him to the clanin'-rod, an' he comminst

114 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

to jabber; the Interprut'r inteprutin' in betweens, an' me
helpin' the Intilligince Departmint wid my clanin'-rod
whin the man misremimbered.

'Prisintly, I learn that, acrost the river, about nine
miles away, was a town just dhrippin' wid dahs, an'
bohs an' arrows, an' dacoits, an' elephints, an' jingles.
' ' Good ! " sez I ; ' ' this office will now close ! ' '

^That night, I went to the Lift'nint an' communicates
my information. I never thought much of Lift'nint
Brazenose till that night. He was shtiff wid books an'
the-ouries, an' all manner av thrimmin's no manner av
use. ''Town did ye say?" sez he. ''Accordin' to the
the-ouries av War, we shud wait for reinforcements."—
''Faith!" thinks I, "we'd betther dig our graves thin"^
for the nearest throops was up to their shtocks in the
marshes out Mimbu way. "But," says the Lift'nint,
"since 'tis a speshil case, I'll make an excepshin. We'll
visit this Lungtungpen to-night."

' The bhoys was fairly woild wid deloight whin I touldf
'em; an', by this an' that, they wint through the jungle
like buck-rabbits. About midnight we come to the
sthrame which I had clane forgot to minshin to my orficer.
I was on ahead, wid four bhoys, an' I thought that the
Lift'nint might want to the-ourise. " Shtrip bhoys ! " sez
I. " Shtrip to the buff and shwim in where glory waits ! "
— "But I can't shwim!" sez two av thim. "To think I
should live to hear that from a bhoy wid a board-school
edukashin ! " sez I. "Take a lump av thimber, an' me an*
Conolly here will ferry ye over, ye young ladies! "

* We got an ould tree- trunk, an' pushed off wid the kits
an' the rifles on it. The night was chokin' dhark, an' just
as we was fairly embarked, I heard the Lift'nint behind

THE TAKING OF LUNGTUNGPEN 115

av me callin' out. ^' There^s a bit av a nullah here, Sorr,"
sez I, ^*but I can feel the bottom aheady." So I cud, for I
*/as not a yard from the bank.

' '' Bit av a nullah! Bit av an eshtuary ! " «ez the Lift'-
nint. *^Go on, ye mad Irishman! Shtrip bhoysl" I
heard him laugh; an' the bhoys begun shtrippin' an' rollin'
a log into the wather to put their kits on. So me an'
Conolly shtruck out through the warm wather wid our
log, an' the rest come on behind.

' That shtrame was miles woide ! Orth'ris, on the rear-
rank log, whispers we had got into the Thames below
Sheerness by mistake. ^'Kape on shwimmin', ye Uttle
blayguard," sez I, ''an' don't go pokin' your dirty jokes
at the Irriwaddy." — ''Silince, men!" sings out the Lift'-
nint. So we shwum on into the black dhark, wid our
chests on the logs, trustin' in the Saints an' the luck av the
British Army.

' Evenshually, we hit ground — a bit av sand — an' a
man. I put my heel on the back av him. He skreeched
an' ran.

'''Now we've done it!" sez Lift'nint Brazenose.
''Where the Divil is Lungtungpen? " There was about a
minute and a half to wait. The bhoys laid a hould av
tl:iclr rifles an' some thried to put their belts on; we was
marchin' with fixed baynits av coorse. Thin we knew
where Lungtungpen was; for we had hit the river-wall av
it in the dhark, an' the whole town blazed wid thim
messin' jingles an' Sniders like a cat's back on a frosty
night. They was firin' all ways at wanst; but over our
bids into the shtrame.

'"Have you got your rifles?" sez Brazenose. "Got
*em!" sez Orth'ris. "I've got that thief Mulvaney's for

ii6 PLAIN TALES FROM .THElHILLS

all my back-pay, an' she'll kick my heart sick wid that
blunderin' long shtock av hers." — ''Go on!" yells Braze-
nose, whippin' his sword out. " Go on aji' take the town/
An' the Lord have mercy on our sowls! "

' Thin the bhoys gave wan divastatin' howl, an' pranced
into the dhark, feelin' for the town, an' blindin' an' stiffin'
like Cavalry Ridin' Masters whin the grass pricked their
bare legs. I hammered wid the butt at some bamboo-
thing that felt wake, an' the rest come an' hammered con-
tagious, while the jingles was jingling, an' f eroshus yells
from inside was shplittin' our ears. We was too close
under the wall for thim to hurt us.

' Evenshually, the thing, whatever ut was, bruk; an' the
six-an'-twinty av us tiunbled, wan after the other, naked
as we were borrun, into the town of Lungtungpen. There
was a melly av a sumpshus kind for a whoile; but whether
they tuk us, all white an' wet, for a new breed av divil, or
a new kind av dacoit, I don't know. They ran as though
we was both, an' we wint into thim, baynit an' butt,
shriekin' wid laughin'. There was torches in the shtreets,
an' I saw little Orth'ris rubbin' his showlther ivry time he
loosed my long-shtock Martini; an' Brazenose walkin'
into the gang wid his sword, like Diarmid av the Gowlden
Collar — barrin' he hadn't a stitch av clothin' on him. We
diskivered elephints wid dacoits under their bellies, an',
what wid wan thing an' another, we was busy till momin'
takin' possession av the town of Lungtungpen.

'Thhi we halted an' formed up, the wimmen howlin' in
the houses an' Lift'nint Brazenose blushin' pink in the
Hght av the momin' sun. 'Twas the most ondasint p'rade
I iver tuk a hand in. Foive-an'-twenty privits an' a orficer
av the Line in review ordher, an' not as much as wud dust

THE TAKING OF LUNGTUNGPEN iiT

a fife betune 'em all in the way of clothinM Eight av us
had their belts an' pouches on; but the rest had gone in
wid a handful av cartridges an' the skin God gave thim.
They was as nakid as Vanus.

'''Number off from the right!" sez the Lift'nint.
"Odd numbers fall out to dress; even numbers pathrol
the town till relieved by the dressing party." Let me
tell you, pathrollin' a town wid nothing on is an ex-
payxitncQ. I pathroUed for tin minutes, an' begad, be-
fore 'twas over, I blushed. The women laughed so.
I niver blushed before or since; but I blushed all over
my carkiss thin. Orth'ris didn't pathrol. He sed only,
'Tortsmith Barricks an' the 'Ard av a Sunday!' Thin
he lay down an' rowled any ways wid laughin'.

'Whin we was all dhressed, we counted the dead —
sivinty-foive dacoits, besides woimded. We tuk five
elephints, a hunder' an' sivinty Sniders, two hunder'
dahs, and a lot av other burglarious thruck. Not a
man av us was hurt — excep' maybe the Lift'nint, an' he
from the shock to his dasincy.

'The Headman av Lungtungpen, who surrinder'd
himself, asked the Literprut'r— "Av the EngUsh fight
like that wid their clo'es off, what in the wurruld do
they do wid their clo'es on?" Orth'ris began rowlin'
his eyes an' crackin' his fingers an' dancin' a step-dance
for to impress the Headman. He ran to his house; an'
we spint the rest av the day carryin' the Lift'nint on
our showlthers round the town, an' playin' wid the
Burmese babies — fat, little, brown Httle divils, as pretty
as picturs.

'Whin I was inviladed for the dysent'ry to India, I
sez to the Lift'nint, "Sorr," sez I, "you've the makin's

ii8 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

in you av a great man; but, av you'll let an ould sodger
spake, you're too fond of the-ourisin'." He shuk hands
wid me and sez, ''Hit high, hit low, there's no plasin'
you, Mulvaney. You've seen me waltzin' through
Lungtungpen Uke a Red Injin widout the war-paint, an'
you say I'm too fond av the-ourisin'?" — "Sorr," sez I,
for I loved the bhoy, "I wud waltz wid you in that
condishin through Hell, an' so wud the rest av the men!"
Tliin I wint downshtrame in the flat an' left him my
blessin'. May the Saints carry ut where ut shud go, for
he was a fine upstandin' young orficer.

'To reshume. Fwhat I've said jist shows the use av
three-year-olds. Wud fifty seasoned sodgers have taken
Lungtungpen in the dhark that way? No! They'd
know the risk av fever and chill. Let alone the shoo tin'.
Two hundher' might have done ut. But the three-year-
olds know Httle an' care less; an' where there's no fear,
there's no danger. Catch thim young, feed thim high,
an' by the honour av that great, little man Bobs, behind
a good orficer 'tisn't only dacoits they'd smash wid their
clo'es off— 'tis Con-tinental Ar-r-r-mies! They tuk
Lungtungpen nakid; an' they'd take St. Pethersburg in
their dhrawers! Begad, they would that!

'Here's your pipe, Sorr. Shmoke her tinderly wid
honey-dew, afther letting the reek av the Canteen plug
die away. But 'tis no good, thanks to you all the same,
fillin' my pouch wid your chopped hay. Canteen
baccy's like the Army. It shpoils a man's taste for
moilder things.'

So saying, Mulvaney took up his butterfly-net, and
returned to barracks.

BITTERS NEAT

The oldest trouble in the world comes from want of un-
derstanding. And it is entirely the fault of the woman.
Somehow, she is built incapable of speaking the truth,
even to herself. She only finds it out about four months
later, when the man is dead, or has been transferred.
Then she says she never was so happy in her Hfe, and
marries some one else, who again touched some woman's
heart elsewhere, and did not know it, but was mixed up
with another man's wiie, who only used him to pique a
third man. And so round again — all criss-cross.

Out here, where life goes quicker than at Home,
things are more obviously tangled, and therefore more
pitiful to look at. Men speak the truth as they under-
stand it, and women as they think men would like to
understand it; and then they all act lies which would
deceive Solomon, and the result is a heartrending
muddle that half a dozen open words would put
straight.

Tliis particular muddle did not differ from any other
muddle you may see, if you are not busy playing cross-
purposes yourself, going on in a big Station any cold
season. Its only merit was that it did not come all
right in the end; as muddles are made to do in the
third volume.

I've forgotten what the man was — he was an ordi-

IIQ

120 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

nary sort of man — 'man you meet any day at the A.-
D.-C.'s end of the table, and go away and forget about.
His name was Surrey; but whether he was in the Army
or the P. W. D., on the Comissariat, or the Police, or a
factory, I don't remember. He wasn't a Civilian. He
was just an ordinary man, of the light-coloured variety,
with a fair moustache and with the average amount of
pay that comes between twenty-seven and thirty-two —
from six to nine hundred a month.

He didn't dance, and he did what little riding he
wanted to do by himself, and was busy in office all day,
and never bothered his head about women. No man
ever dreamed he would. He was of the type that doesn't
marry, just because it doesn't think about marriage.
He was one of the plain cards, whose only use is to make
up the pack, and furnish background to put the Court
cards against.

Then there was a girl — ordinary girl — the dark-
coloured variety — daughter of a man in the Army,
who played a little, sang a little, talked a little, and
furnished the background, exactly as Surrey did. She
had been sent out here to get married if she could, be-
cause there were many sisters at home, and Colonels'
allowances aren't elastic. She Hved with an aunt.
She was a Miss Tallaght, and men spelt her name
*Tart' on the programmes when they couldn't catch
what the introducer said.

Surrey and she were thrown together in the same
Station one cold weather; and the particular Devil
who looks after muddles prompted Miss Tallaght to
fall in love with Surrey. He had spoken to her per-
haps twenty times — certainly not more — but she fell

BITTERS NEAT iit

as unreasoiiingly in love with him as if she had been
Elaine and he Lancelot.

She, of course, kept her own counsel; and, equally
of course, her manner to Surrey, who never noticed
manner or style or dress any more than he noticed a
sunset, was icy, not to say repellent. The deadly dull-
ness of Surrey struck her as a reserve of force, and she
grew to belive he was wonderfully clever in some secret
and mysterious sort of line. She did not know what
line; but she believed, and that was enough. No one
suspected anything of any kind, for the simple reason
that no one took any deep interest in Miss Tallaght ex-
cept her Aunt; who wanted to get the girl off her hands.

This went on for some months, till a man suddenly
woke up to the fact that Miss Tallaght was the one
woman in the world for him, and told her so. She
jawabed him — without rhyme or reason; and that night
there followed one of those awful bedroom conferences
that men know nothing about. Miss Tallaght's Aunt,
querulous, indignant, and merciless, with her mouth
full of hair-pins, and her hands full of false hair-plaits,
set herself to find out by cross-examination what in the
name of everything wise, prudent, religious, and duti-
ful, Miss Tallaght meant by jawahing her suitor. The
conference lasted for an hour and a half, with question
on question, insult and reminders of poverty — appeals
to Providence, then a fresh mouthful of hair-pins — then
all the questions over again, beginning with: — 'But

what do you see to dislike in Mr. ?' then, a vicious

tug at what was left of the mane; then impressive warn-
ings and more appeals to Heaven; and then the collapse
of poor Miss Tallaght, a rumpled, crumpled, tear-stained

122 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

arrangement in white on the couch at the foot of the bed,
and, between sobs and gasps, the whole absurd little
story of her love for Surrey.

Now, in all the forty-iive years' experience of Mis3
Tallaght's Aunt, she had never heard of a girl throwing
over a real genuine lover with an appointment, for a
problematical, hypothetical lover to whom she had
spoken merely in the course of the ordinary social
visiting rounds. So Miss Tallaght's Aunt was struck
dumb, and, merely praying that Heaven might direct
Miss Tallaght into a better frame of mind, dismissed
the ayah, and went to bed; leaving Miss Tallaght to sob
and moan herself to sleep.

Understand clearly, I don't for a moment defend
Miss Tallaght. She was wrong — absurdly wrong-
but attachments Hke hers must sprout by the law of
averages, just to remind people that Love is as nakedly
unreasoning as when Venus first gave him his kit and
told him to run away and play.

Surrey must be held innocent — innocent as his own
pony. Could he guess that, when Miss Tallaght was
as curt and as unpleasing as she knew how, she would
have risen up and followed him from Colombo to Dadar
at a word? He didn't know anything, or care any-
thing about Miss Tallaght. He had his work to do.

Miss Tallaght's Aunt might have respected her
niece's secret. But she didn't. What we call 'talk-
ing rank scandal,' she called 'seeking advice'; and
she sought advice, on the case of Miss Tallaght, from
the Judge's wife 4n strict confidence, my dear,' who
told the Commissioner's wife, 'of course you won't
repeat it, my dear,' who told the Deputy Commis-

BITTERS NEAT 123

sioner's wife, *you understand it is to go no further,
my dear,' who told the newest bride, who was so de-
lighted at being in possession of a secret concerning
real grown-up men and women, that she told any one
and every one who called on her. So the tale went all
over the Station, and from being no one in particular.
Miss Tallaght came to take precedence of the last in-
teresting squabble between the Judge's wife and the
Civil Engineer's wife. Then began a really interest-
ing system of persecution worked by women — soft
and sympathetic and intangible, but calculated to drive
a girl off her head. They were all so sorry for Miss
Tallaght, and they cooed together and were exagger-
atedly kind and sweet in their manner to her, as those
who said: — ^You may confide in us, my stricken deer!'

Miss Tallaght was a woman, and sensitive. It took
her less than one evening at the Band Stand to find
that her poor little, precious little secret, that had been
wrenched from her on the rack, was known as widely
as if it had been written on her hat. I don't know
what she went through. Women don't speak of these
things, and men ought not to guess; but it must have
been some specially refined torture, for she told her
Aimt she would go Home and die as a Governess sooner
than stay in this hateful — hateful — ^place. Her Aunt
said she was a rebellious girl, and sent her Home to her
people after a couple of months; and said no one knew
what the pains of a chaperone^s Hfe were.

Poor Miss Tallaght had one pleasure just at the last.
Halfway down the line, she caught a glimpse of Sur-
rey, who had gone down on duty, and was then in the
up-train. And he took off his hat to her. She went

124 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

Home, and if she is not dead by this time must be liv-
ing still.

Months afterwards, there was a lively dinner at the
Club for the Races. Surrey was mooning about as
usual, and there was a good deal of idle talk flying
every way. Finally, one man, who had taken more
than was good for him, said, apropos of something
about Surrey's reserved ways, — 'Ah, you old fraud.
It's all very well for you to pretend. I know a girl
who was awf'ly mashed on you — once. Dead nuts
she was on old Surrey. What had you been doing,
eh?'

Surrey expected some sort of sell, and said with ?.
laugh: —

'Who was she?'

Before any one could kick the man, he plumped out
with the name; and the Honorary Secretary tactfully
upset the half of a big brew of shandy-gaff all over the
table. After the mopping up, the men went out to
the Lotteries.

But Surrey sat on, and, after ten minutes, said very
humbly to the only other man in the deserted dining-
room: — 'On your honour, was there a word of truth in
what the drunken fool said? '

Then the man who is writing this story, who had known
of the thing from the beginning, and now felt all the hope-
lessness and tangle of it, — the waste and the muddle, —
said, a good deal more energetically than he meant: —

' Truth ! 0 man, man, couldn't you see it? '

Surrey said nothing, but sat still, smoking and smoking

BITTERS NEAT 125

and thinking, while the Lottery tent babbled outside, and
the khitmutgars turned down the lamps.

To the best of my knowledge and belief that was the
first thing Surrey ever knew about love. But his awaken-
ing did not seem to delight him. It must have been rather
unpleasant, to judge by the look on his face. He looked
like a man who had missed a train and had been half
stunned at the same time.

When the men came in from the Lotteries, Surrey went
out. He wasn't in the mood for bones and 'horse' talk.
He went to his tent, and the last thing he said, quite aloud
to himself, was:— 'I didn't see. I didn't see. lilhs^di only
known!'

Even if he had known I don't believe . . .

But these things are kismet, and we only find out aD
about them just when any knowledge is too late.

A GERM-DESTROYER

Pleasant it is for the Little Tin Gods

When great Jove nods;
But Little Tin Gods make their little mistakes
In missing the hour when great Jove wakes.

As a general rule, it is inexpedient to meddle with
questions of State in a land where men are highly paid to
work them out for you. This tale is a justifiable excep-
tion.

Once in every five years, as you know, we indent for a
new Viceroy; and each Viceroy imports, with the rest of
his baggage, a Private Secretary, who may or may not be
the real Viceroy, just as Fate ordains. Fate looks after
the Indian Empire because it is so big and so helpless.

There was a Viceroy once, who brought out with him a
turbulent Private Secretary — a hard man with a soft
manner and a morbid passion for work. This Secretary
was called Wonder — John Fennil Wonder. The Viceroy
possessed no name — nothing but a string of counties and
two-thirds of the alphabet after them. He said, in confi-
dence, that he was the electro-plated figure-head of a
golden administration, and he watched in a dreamy,
amused way Wonder's attempts to draw matters which
were entirely outside his province into his own hands.
* When we are all cherubims together,' said His Excellency
once, ^my dear, good friend Wonder will head the con-

126

A GERM-DESTROYER 127

spiracy for plucking out Gabriel's tail-feathers or stealing
Peter's keys. Then I shall report him.'

But, though the Viceroy did nothing to check Wonder's
officiousness, other people said unpleasant things. Maybe
the Members of Council began it; but, finally, all Simla
agreed that there was ' too much Wonder, and too little
Viceroy' in that rule. Wonder was always quoting 'His
Excellency.' It was ' His Excellency this,' ' His Excellency
that,' 'In the opinion of His Excellency,' and so on. The
Viceroy smiled; but he did not heed. He said that, so
long as his old men squabbled with his 'dear, good Won-
der,' they might be induced to leave the Immemorial East
in peace.

'No wise man has a Policy,' said the Viceroy. 'A
Policy is the blackmail levied on the Fool by the Unfore-
seen. I am not the former, and I do not believe in the
latter.'

I do not quite see what this means, unless it refers to an
Insurance Policy. Perhaps it was the Viceroy's way of
saying, 'Lie low.'

That season, came up to Simla one of these crazy
people with only a single idea. These are the men who
make things move; but they are not nice to talk to. This
man's name was Mellish, and he had lived for fifteen
years on land of his own, in Lower Bengal, studying
cholera. He held that cholera was a germ that propagated
itself as it flew through a muggy atmosphere; and stuck
in the branches of trees like a wool-flake. The germ
could be rendered sterile, he said, by 'Mellish's Own In-
vincible P'umigatory' — a heavy violent-black powder — •
'the result of fifteen years' scientific investigation, Sir!'

Inventors seem very much alike as a caste. They talk

128 PLAIN^TALES FROM THE HILLS

loudly, especially about 'conspiracies of monopolists';
they beat upon the table with their fists; and they secrete
fragments of their inventions about their persons.

Mellish said that there was a Medical 'Ring' at Simla,
headed by the Surgeon- General, who was in league, ap-
parently, with all the Hospital Assistants in the Empire.
I forget exactly how he proved it, but it had something to
to with 'skulking up to the Hills'; and what Mellish
wanted was the independent evidence of the Viceroy —
'Steward of Her Majesty the Queen, Sir.' So Mellish
went up to Simla, with eighty-four pounds of Fumigatory
in his trunk, to speak to the Viceroy and to show him the
merits of the invention.

But it is easier to see a Viceroy than to talk to him,
unless you chance to be as important as Mellishe of
Madras. He was a six-thousand-rupee man, so great that
his daughters never 'married.' They * contracted
alliances.' He himself was not paid. He 'received
emoluments,' and his journeys about the country were
' tours of observation.' His business was to stir up the
people in Madras with a long pole — as you stir up tench
in a pond — and the people had to come up out of their
comfortable old ways and gasp — 'This is Enhghtenment
and Progress. Isn't it fine!' Then they gave MeUishe
statues and jasmine garlands, in the hope of getting rid of
him.

Mellishe came up to Simla 'to confer with the Viceroy.'
That was one of his perquisites. The Viceroy knew
nothing of Mellishe except that he was 'one of those
middle-class deities who seem necessary to the spiritual
comfort of this Paradise of the Middle-classes,' and that,
in all probability, he had 'suggested, designed, founded.

A GERM-DESTROYER 129

and endowed all the public institutions in Madras.'
Which proves that His Excellency, though dreamy, had
experience of the ways of six- thousand-rupee men.

Mellishe's name was E. Mellishe, and Mellish's was E.
S. Mellish, and they were both staying at the same hotel,
and the Fate that looks after the Indian Empire ordained
that Wonder should blunder and drop the final ' e '; that
the Chaprassi should help him, and that the note which
ran: —

Dear Mr. Mellish, — Can you set aside your other engagements,
and lunch with us at two to-morrow? His Excellency has an hour at
at your disposal then,

should be given to Mellish with the Fumigatory. He
nearly wept with pride and delight, and at the appointed
hour cantered to Peterhoff , a big paper-bag full of the
Fumigatory in his coat-tail pockets. He had his chance,
and he meant to make the most of it. Mellishe of Madras
had been so portentously solemn about his ' conference,*
that Wonder had arranged for a private tiffin, — no A.-D.-
C.'s, no Wonder, no one but the Viceroy, who said
plaintively that he feared being left alone with unmuzzled
autocrats like the great Mellishe of Madras.

But his guest did not bore the Viceroy. On the con-
trary, he amused him. Mellish was nervously anxious to
go straight to his Fumigatory, and talked at random
until tiffin was over and His Excellency asked him to
smoke. The Viceroy was pleased with Mellish because he
did not talk 'shop.'

As soon as the cheroots were lit, Mellish spoke like u
man; beginning with his cholera- theory, reviewing hi*

J30 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

fifteen years' ^scientific labours,' the machinations of the
'Simla Ring/ and the excellence of his Fumigatory,
while the Viceroy watched him between half-shut eyes
and thought — 'Evidently this is the wrong tiger; but it is
an original animal.' MeUish's hair was standing on end
with excitement, and he stammered. He began groping
in his coat-tails and, before the Viceroy knew what was
about to happen, he had tipped a bagful of his powder
into the big silver ash-tray.

'J-j-judge for yourself, Sir,' said MelHsh. 'Y' Ex-
cellency shall judge for yourself ! Absolutely infallible, on
my honour.'

He plunged the Hghted end of his cigar into the powder,
which began to smoke like a volcano, and send up fat,
greasy wreaths of copper-coloured smoke. In five seconds
the room was filled with a most pungent and sickening
stench — a reek that took fierce hold of the trap of your
windpipe and shut it. The powder hissed and fizzed, and
sent out blue and green sparks, and the smoke rose till you
could neither see, nor breathe, nor gasp. Mellish, how-
ever, was used to it.

'Nitrate of strontia,' he shouted; 'baryta, bone-meal.
Thousand cubic feet smoke per cubic inch. Not a germ
could live — not a germ, Y' Excellency!'

But His Excellency had fled, and was coughing at the
foot of the stairs, while all Peterhoff hummed Hke a hive.
Red Lancers came in, and the head Chaprassi who speaks
EngUsh, came in, and mace-bearers came in and ladies ran
downstairs screaming 'Fire'; for the smoke was drifting
through the house and oozing out of the windows, and
bellying along the verandahs, and wreathing and writhing
across the gardens. No one could enter the room where

A GERM-DESTROYER 131

MelHsh was lecturing on his Fumigatory, till that un-
«^peakable powder had burnt itself out.

Then an Aide-de-Camp, who desired the V. C, rushed
chrough the rolling clouds and hauled Mellish into the
hall. The Viceroy was prostrate with laughter, and could
only waggle his hands feebly at MelHsh, who was shaking
a fresh bagful of powder at him.

' Glorious ! Glorious !' sobbed His Excellency. * Not a
germ, as you justly observe, could exist! I can swear it.
A magnificent success ! '

Then he laughed till the tears came, and Wonder, who
had caught the real Mellishe snorting on the Mall, entered
and was deeply shocked at the scene. But the Viceroy
was delighted, because he saw that Wonder would
presently depart. Mellish with the Fumigatory was also
pleased, for he felt that he had smashed the Simla Medi-
cal'Ring.'

Few men could tell a story like His Excellency when he
took the trouble, and his account of 'my dear, good
Wonder's friend with the powder' went the round of
Simla, and flippant folk made Wonder unhappy by their
.emarks.

But His Excellency told the tale once too often —
for Wonder. As he meant to do. It was at a Seepee
Picnic. Wonder was sitting just behind the Viceroy.

'And I really thought for a moment,' wound up
His Excellency, ' that my dear, good Wonder had hired
an assassin to clear his way to the throne ! '

Every one laughed; but there was a delicate sub-
tinkle in the Viceroy's tone which Wonder understood.

^3 PLAIN TALES FROM THE fflLLS

He found that his health was giving way; and tho
Viceroy allowed him to go, and presented him with a
flaming * character' for use at Home among big people.
^My fault entirely/ said His Excellency, in after
seasons, with a twinkle in his eye. ^My inconsistency
must always have been distasteful to such a masterly
man.'

KIDNAPPED

There is a tide in the affairs of men,

Which, taken any way you please, is bad,

And strands them in forsaken guts and creeks

No decent soul would think of visiting.

You cannot stop the tide; but, now and then,

You may arrest some rash adventurer

Who — ^h'm — will hardly thank you for your pains.

— Vibart's Moralities,

We are a high-caste and enlightened race, and infant-
marriage is very shocking and the consequences are
sometimes pecuKar; but, nevertheless, the Hindu notion
— which is the Continental notion, which is the ab-
original notion — of arranging marriages irrespective of
the personal incKnations of the married, is sound. Think
for a minute, and you will see that it must be so; unless,
of course, you beHeve in 'affinities.' In which case you
had better not read this tale. How can a man who has
never married; who cannot be trusted to pick up at sight
a moderately sound horse; whose head is hot and upset
with visions of domestic felicity, go about the choosing of
a wife? He cannot see straight or think straight if he
tries; and the same disadvantages exist in the case of a
girl's fancies. But when mature, married, and discreet
people arrange a match between a boy and a girl, they
do it sensibly, with a view to the future, and the young
couple live happily ever afterwards. As everybody knows.

133

134 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

Properly speaking, Government should establish a
Matrimonial Department, efficiently officered, with a
Jury of Matrons, a Judge of the Chief Court, a Senior
Chaplain, and an Awful Warning, in the shape of a
love-match that has gone wrong, chained to the trees
in the courtyard. All marriages should be made through
the Department, which might be subordinate to the
Educational Department, under the same penalty as
that attaching to the transfer of land without a stamped
document. But Government won't take suggestions.
It pretends that it is too busy. However, I will put my
notion on record, and explain the example that illus-
trates the theory.

Once upon a time, there was a good young man —
a first-class officer in his own Department — a man
with a career before him and, possibly, a K. C. I. E.
at the end of it. All his superiors spoke well of him,
because he knew how to hold his tongue and his pen
at the proper times. There are, to-day, only eleven
men in India who possess this secret; and they have

I

This good young man was quiet and self-contained— |
too old for his years by far. Which always carries its
own punishment. Had a Subaltern or a Tea-Planter's
Assistant, or anybody who enjoys Hfe and has no care
for to-morrow, done what he tried to do, not a soul
would have cared. But when Peythroppe — the esti-
mable, virtuous, economical, quiet, hard-working, young
Peythroppe — fell, there was a flutter through five De-
partments.

The manner of his fall was in this way. He met

all, with one exception, attained great honour and enor*
mous incomes.

KIDNAPPED 13S

a Miss Castries — d'Castries it was originally, but the
family dropped the d' for administrative reasons — and
he fell in love with her even more energetically than
he worked. Understand clearly that there was not
a breath of a word to be said against Miss Castries —
not a shadow of a breath. She was good and very
lovely — possessed what innocent people at Home call
a 'Spanish' complexion, with thick blue-black hair
growing low down on the forehead, into a 'widow's
peak,' and big violet eyes under eyebrows as black and
as straight as the borders of a Gazette Extraordinary,

when a big man dies. But ^but ^but Well,

she was a very sweet girl and very pious, but for many
reasons she was 'impossible.' Quite so. All good
Mammas know what 'impossible' means. It was
obviously absurd that Peythroppe should marry her.
The little opal-tinted onyx at the base of her finger-nails
said this as plainly as print. Further, marriage with
Miss Castries meant marriage with several other Cas-
tries—Honorary Lieutenant Castries her Papa, Mrs.
Eulalie Castries her Mamma, and all the ramifications
of the Castries family, on incomes ranging from Rs.
175 to Rs. 470 a month, and their wives and connections
again.

It would have been cheaper for Peythroppe to have
assaulted a Commissioner with a dog-whip, or to have
burned the records of a Deputy-Commissioner's Office,
than to have contracted an alliance with the Castries.
It would have weighted his after-career less — even
imder a Government which never [forgets and never
forgives. Everybody saw this but, Peythroppe. He
was going to marry Miss Castries, he was — being of

136 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

age and drawing a good income — and woe betide the
house that would not afterwards receive Mrs. Virginie
Saulez Peythroppe with the deference due to her hus-
band's rank. That was Peythroppe's ultimatum, and
any remonstrance drove him frantic.

These sudden madnesses most afHict the sanest men.
There was a case once — but I will tell you of that later
on. You cannot account for the mania except under
a theory directly contradicting the one about the Place
where marriages are made. Peythroppe was bumingly
anxious to put a millstone round his neck at the outset
of his career; and argument had not the least effect on
him. He was going to marry Miss Castries, and the
business was his own business. He would thank you to
keep your advice to yourself. With a man in this
condition, mere words only fix him in his purpose.
Of course he cannot see that marriage in India does
not concern the individual but the Government he
serves.

Do you remember Mrs. Hauksbee — the most won-
derful woman in India? She saved PlufHes from Mrs.
Reiver, won Tarrion his appointment in the Foreign
Office, and was defeated in open field by Mrs. Cusack-
Bremmil. She heard of the lamentable condition of Pey-
throppe, and her brain struck out the plan that saved
him. She had the wisdom of the Serpent, the logical
coherence of the Man, the fearlessness of the Child, and
the triple intuition of the Woman. Never — no, never
■ — as long as a tonga buckets down the Solon dip, or the
couples go a-riding at the back of Summer Hill, will
there be such a genius as Mrs. Hauksbee. She attended
the consultation of Three Men on Peythroppe's case; and

KIDNAPPED 137

The stood up with the lash of her riding-whip between
• ler lips and spake.

Three weeks later, Peythroppe dined with the Three
Men, and the Gazette of India came in. Peythroppe
found to his surprise that he had been gazetted a month's
leave. Don't ask me how this was managed. I beheve
firmly that, if Mrs. Hauksbee gave the order, the whole
Great Indian Administration would stand on its head.
The Three Men had also a month's leave each. Pey-
throppe put the Gazette down and said bad words. Then
there came from the compound the soft 'pad-pad' of
camels — 'thieves' camels,' the Bikaneer breed that
don't bubble and howl when they sit down and get up.

After that, I don't know what happened. This much
is certain. Peythroppe disappeared — vanished like
smoke — and the long foot-rest chair in the house of the
Three Men was broken to splinters. Also a bedstead
departed from one of the bedrooms.

Mrs. Hauksbee said that Mr. Peythroppe was shoot-
ing in Rajputana with the Three Men; so we were com-
pelled to believe her.

At the end of the month, Peythroppe was gazetted
twenty days' extension of leave; but there was wrath
and lamentation in the house of Castries. The mar-
riage-day had been fixed, but the bridegroom never
came: and the D'Silvas, Pereiras, and Ducketts lifted
their voices and mocked Honorary Lieutenant Castries
as one who had been basely imposed upon. Mrs.
Hauksbee went to the wedding, and was much aston-
ished when Peytiiroppe did not appear. After seven

138 1>LA1N TALES FROM THE HILLS

weeks, Peythroppe and the Three Men returned from
Rajputana. Peythroppe was in hard tough condition,
rather white, and more self-contained than ever.

One of the Three Men had a cut on his nose, caused
by the kick of a gun. Twelve-bores kick rather curi-
ously.

Then came Honorary Lieutenant Castries, seeking
for the blood of his perfidious son-in-law to be. He
said things — vulgar and 'impossible' things which
showed the raw rough * ranker' below the 'Honorary,'
and I fancy Peythroppe's eyes were opened. Anyhow,
he held his peace till the end; when he spoke briefly.
Honorary Lieutenant Castries asked for a 'peg' before
he went away to die or bring a suit for breach of
promise.

Miss Castries was a very good girl. She said that
she would have no breach of promise suits. She said
that, if she was not a lady, she was refined enough to
know that ladies kept their broken hearts to themselves;
and, as she ruled her parents, nothing happened. Later
on, she married a most respectable and gentlemanly per-
son. He travelled for an enterprising firm in Calcutta,
and was all that a good husband should be.

So Peythroppe came to his right mind again, and
did much good work, and was honoured by all who knew
him. One of these days he will marry; but he will
marry a sweet pink-and-white maiden, on the Govern-
ment House List, with a little money and some influential
connections, as every wise man should. And he will
never, all his life, tell her what happened during the
seven weeks of his shooting-tour in Rajputana.

But just think how much trouble and expense—

KIDNAPPED 139

for camel-hire is not cheap, and those Bikaneer brutes
had to be fed like humans — might have been saved by
a properly conducted Matrimonial Department, under
the control of the Director- General of Education, but
corresponding direct with the Viceroy.

I

THE ARREST OF LIEUTENANT GOLIGHTLY

*I've forgotten the countersign,' sez 'e.

*0h! You 'ave, 'ave you? ' sez I.

* But I'm the Colonel,' sez 'e.

'Oh! You are, are you?' sez I. 'Colonel or nor Colonel, you wait*
*ere till I'm relieved, an' the Sarjint reports on your ugly old mug. ChoopT
aezl.

An* s'elp me soul, 'twas the Colonel after all! But I was a recruity then.
— The Unedited Autobiography of Private Ortlteris.

If there was one thing on which Golightly prided
himself more than another, it was looking like 'an
Officer and a Gentleman.' He said it was for the
honour of the Service that he attired himself so elab-
orately; but those who knew him best said that it was
just personal vanity. There was no harm about Go-
lightly — not an ounce. He recognised a horse when he
saw one, and could do more than fill a cantle. He
played a very fair game at biUiards, and was a sound
man at the whist- table. Every one liked him; and
nobody ever dreamed of seeing him handcuffed on a
station platform as a deserter. But this sad thing hap-
pened.

He was going down from Dalhousie, at the end of
his leave — riding down. He had run his leave as
fine as he dared, and wanted to come down in a hurry.

140

THE ARREST OF LIEUTENANT GOLIGHTLY .14X

It was fairly warm at Dalhousie, and, knowing what to
expect below, he descended in a new khaki suit — tight
fitting — of a delicate olive-green; a peacock-blue tie,
white collar, and a snowy white solah hehnet. He prided
himself on looking neat even when he was riding post.
He did look neat, and he was so deeply concerned about
his appearance before he started that he quite forgot to
take anything but some small change with him. He left
all his notes at the hotel. His servants had gone down the
road before him, to be ready in waiting at Pathankote
with a change of gear. That was what he called travelling
in ' light marching-order.' He was proud of his faculty of
organisation — what we call bundobusL

Twenty-two miles out of Dalhousie it began to rain —
not a mere hill-shower, but a good, tepid, monsoonish
downpour. GoHghtly bustled on, wishing that he had
brought an umbrella. The dust on the roads turned into
mud, and the pony mired a good deal. So did GoHghtly's
khaki gaiters. But he kept on steadily and tried to think
how pleasant the coolth was.

His next pony was rather a brute at starting, and,
GoHghtly's hands being sHppery with the rain, contrived
to get rid of GoHghtly at a corner. He chased the animal,
caught it, and went ahead briskly. The spiU had not im-
proved his clothes or his temper, and he had lost one spur.
He kept the other one employed. By the time that stage
was ended, the pony had had as much exercise as he
wanted, and, in spite of the rain, GoHghtly was sweating
freely. At the end of another miserable half-hour Go-
Hghtly found the world disappear before his eyes in
clammy pulp. The rain had turned the pith of his huge
and snowy solah-topee into an evil-smelling dough, and it

142 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

had closed on his head hke a half-opened mushroom. Also
the green Hning was beginning to run.

GoKghtly did not say anything worth recording here.
He tore off and squeezed up as much of the brim as was in
his eyes and ploughed on. The back of the helmet was
flapping on liis neck and the sides stuck to his ears, but
the leather band and green lining kept tilings roughly to-
gether, so that the hat did not actually melt away where
it flapped.

Presently, the pulp and the green stuff made a sort of
slimy mildew which ran over GoHghtly in several direc-
tions— down his back and bosom for choice. The khaki
colour ran too — it was really shockingly bad dye — and
sections of GoKghtly were brown, and patches were violet,
and contours were ochre, and streaks were ruddy-red, and
blotches were nearly white, according to the nature and
peculiarities of the dye. When he took out his handker-
chief to wipe his face, and the green of the hat-lining and
the purple stuff that had soaked through on to his neck
from the tie became thoroughly mixed, the effect was
amazing.

Near Dhar the ram stopped and the evening sun came
out and dried him up sHghtly. It fLxed the colours, too.
Three miles from Pathankote the last pony fell dead lame,
and Golightly was forced to walk. He pushed on into
Pathankote to find his servants. He did not know then
that his khitmatgar had stopped by the roadside to get
drunk, and would come on the next day saying that he
had sprained his ankle. When he got into Pathankote he
couldn't find his servants, his boots were stiff and ropy
with mud, and there were large quantities of dust about
his body. The blue tie had run as much as the khaku §Q

THE ARREST OF LIEUTENANT GOLIGHTLY 143

he took it off with the collar and threw it away. Then he
said something about servants generally and tried to get a
peg. He paid eight annas for the drink, and this revealed
to him that he had only six annas more in his pocket— or
in the world as he stood at that hour.

He went to the Station-Mas ter to negotiate for a first-
class ticket to Khasa, where he was stationed. The book-
ing-clerk said something to the Station-Master, the
Station-Master said something to the telegraph clerk, and
the three looked at hun with curiosity. They asked him
to wait for half an hour, while they telegraphed to Umrit-
sar for authority. So he waited and four constables came
and grouped themselves picturesquely round him. Just
as he was preparing to ask them to go away, the Station-
Master said that he would give the Sakih a ticket to Um-
ritsar, if the Sahib would kindly come inside the booking-
office. Golightly stepped inside, and the next thing he
knew was that a constable was attached to each of his
legs and arms, while the Station-Master was trying to
cram a mail-bag over liis head.

There was a very fair scuffle all round the booking-
office, and Golightly took a nasty cut over his eye through
falling against a table. But the constables were too much
for him, and they and the Station-Master handcuffed him
securely. As soon as the mail-bag was sHpped, he began
expressing his opinions, and the head constable said,
'Without doubt this is the soldier-Englishman we re-
quired. Listen to the abuse ! ' Then Golightly asked the
Station-Master what the this and the that the proceedings
meant. The Station-Master told him he was 'Private

John Binkle of the Regiment, 5 ft. 9 in., fair hair,

gray eyes, and a dissipated appearance, no marks on the

144 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

body/ who had deserted a fortnight ago. Golightly began
explaining at great length; and the more he explained the
less the Station-Master believed him. He said that no
Lieutenant could look such a ruffian as did Golightly, and
that his instructions were to send his capture under
proper escort to Umritsar. Golightly was feehng very
damp and imcomfortable and the language he used was
not fit for publication, even in an expurgated form. The
four constables saw him safe to Umritsar in an inter-
mediate' compartment, and he spent the four-hour
journey in abusing them as fluently as his knowledge of
the vernaculars allowed.

At Umritsar he was bundled out on the platform into

the arms of a Corporal and two men of the Regiment.

Golightly drew himself up and tried to carry off matters
jauntily. He did not feel too jaunty in handcuffs, with
four constables behind him, and the blood from the cut on
his forehead stiffening on his left cheek. The Corporal
was not jocular either. Golightly got as far as — ' This is a
very absurd mistake, my men/ when the Corporal told
him to ' stow his lip ' and come along. GoKghtly did not
want to come along. He desired to stop and explain. He
explained very well indeed, until the Corporal cut in with
— ' You a orficer! It's the like o' you as brings disgrace on
the likes of us. Bloomin' fine orficer you are! I know
your regiment. The Rogue's March is the quickstep
where you come from. You're a black shame to the
Service.'

Golightly kept his temper, and began explaining all
over again from the beginning. Then he was marched out
of the rain into the refreshment-room and told not to
make a qualified fool of himself. The men were going to

THE ARREST OF LIEUTENANT GOLIGHTLY 145

run him up to Fort Govindghar. And 'ninning up' is a
performance almost as undignified as the Frog March.

Golightly was nearly hysterical with rage and the chill
and the mistake and the handcuffs and the headache that
the cut on his forehead had given him. He really laid him-
self out to express what was in his mind. When he had
quite finished and his throat was feeling dry, one of the
men said, ^IVe 'eard a few beggars in the cHnk bUnd, stiff
and crack on a bit; but I've never 'eard any one to touch
this 'ere ^'orficer.'" They were not angry with him.
They rather admired him. They had some beer at the
refreshment-room, and offered Golightly some too, be-
cause he had 'swore won'erfuL' They asked him to tell
them all about the adventures of Private John Binkle
while he was loose on the country-side; and that made
Golightly wilder than ever. If he had kept his wits about
him he would have been quiet until an ofi&cer came; but
he attempted to run.

Now the butt of a Martini in the small of your back
hurts a great deal, and rotten, rain-soaked khaki tears
easily when two men are jerking at your collar.

Golightly rose from the floor feeling very sick and
giddy, with his sliirt ripped open all down his breast and
nearly all down his back. He yielded to his luck, and at
that point the down-train from Lahore came in, carrying
one of GoHghtly's Majors.

This is the Major's evidence in full —

'There was the sound of a scuffle in the second-class re-
freshment-room, so I went in and saw the most viUainous
loafer that I ever set eyes on. His boots and breeches
were plastered with mud and beer-stains. He wore a
muddy-white dunghill sort of thing on his head, and it

146 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

hung down in slips on his shoulders, which were a good
deal scratched. He was half in and haK out of a shirt as
nearly in two pieces as it could be, and he was begging the
guard to look at the name on the tail of it. As he had
rucked the shirt all over his head, I couldn't at first see
who he was, but I fancied that he was a man in the first
stage of D. T. from the way he swore while he wrestled
with his rags. When he turned round, and I had made
allowances for a lump as big as a pork-pie over one eye,
and some green war-paint on the face, and some violet
stripes round the neck, I saw that it was Golightly. He
was very glad to see me, said the Major, * and he hoped I
would not tell the Mess about it. / didn't, but you can,
if you Hke, now that Golightly has gone Home.'

GoHghtly spent the greater part of that summer in
trying to get the Corporal and the two soldiers tried by
Court-Martial for arresting an 'officer and a gentleman.'
They were, of course, very sorry for their error. But the
tale leaked into the regimental canteen, and thence ran
about the Province.

IN THE HOUSE OF SUDDHOO

A stone's throw out on either hand
From that well-ordered road we tread,

And all the world is wild and strange:
Churel and ghoul and Djinn and sprite
Shall bear us company to-night,
For we have reached the Oldest Land

Wherein the Powers of Darkness range.

— From the Dusk to the Dawn,

The house of Suddhoo, near the Taksali Gate, is two-
storied, with four carved windows of old brown wood, and
a flat roof. You may recognise it by five red hand-prints
arranged Kke the Five of Diamonds on the whitewash be-
tween the upper windows. Bhagwan Dass the grocer and
a man who says he gets his living by seal-cutting live in
the lower story with a troop of wives, servants, friends,
and retainers. The two upper rooms used to be occupied
by Janoo and Azizun and a Httle black-and-tan terrier
that was stolen from an Englisnman's house and given to
Janoo by a soldier. To-day, only Janoo lives in the upper
rooms. Suddhoo sleeps on the roof generally, except
when he sleeps in the street. He used to go to Peshawar
in the cold weather to visit his son who sells curiosities
near the Edwardes' Gate, and then he slept under a real
mud roof. Suddhoo is a great friend of mine, because his
cousin had a son who secured, thanks to my recommen-
dation, the post of head-messenger to a big firm in the

147

148 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

Station. Suddhoo says that God will make me a Lieu-
tenant-Governor one of these days. I dare say his
prophecy will come true. He is very, very old, with white
hair and no teeth worth showing, and he has outlived his
wits — outlived nearly everything except his fondness for
his son at Peshawar. Janoo and Azizun are Kashmiris,
Ladies of the City, and theirs was an ancient and more or
less honourable profession; but Azizun has since married
a medical student from the North-West and has settled
down to c. most respectable hfe somewhere near Bareilly.
Bhagwan Dass is an extortionate and an adulterator. He
is very rich. The man who is supposed to get his living
by seal-cutting pretends to be very poor. This lets you
know as much as is necessary of the four principal
tenants in the house of Suddhoo. Then there is Me of
course; but I am only the chorus that comes in at the end
to explain things. So I do not count.

Suddhoo was not clever. The man who pretended to
cut seals was the cleverest of them all — Bhagwan Dass
only knew how to lie — except Janoo. She was also
beautiful, but that was her own affair.

Suddhoo's son at Peshawar was attacked by pleurisy,
and old Suddhoo was troubled. The seal-cutter man
heard of Suddhoo's anxiety and made capital out of it.
He was abreast of the times. He got a friend in Pesha-
war to telegraph daily accounts of the son's health. And
here the story begins.

Suddhoo's cousin's son told me, one evemng, that
Suddhoo wanted to see me; that he was too old and feeble
to come personally, and that I should be conferring an
everlasting honour on the House of Suddhoo if I went to
him. I went; but I think, seeing how well off Suddhoo,

IN THE HOUSE OF SUDDHOO X4f

was then, that he might have sent something better than
an ekka, which jolted fearfully, to haul out a future
Lieutenant-Governor to the City on a muggy April
evening. The ekka did not run quickly. It was full dark
when we pulled up opposite the door of Ranjit Singh's
Tomb near the main gate of the Fort. Here was Suddhoo,
and he said that, by reason of my condescension, it was
absolutely certain that I should become a Lieutenant-
Governor while my hair was yet black. Then we talked
about the weather and the state of my health, and the
wheat crops, for fifteen minutes, in the Huzuri Bagh
under the stars.

Suddhoo came to the point at last. He said that Janoo
had told him that there was an order of the Sirkar against
magic, because it was feared thr.t magic might one day
kill the Empress of India. I didn't know anything about
the state of the law; but I fancied that something interest-
ing was going to happen. I said that so far from magic
being discouraged by the Government it was highly com-
mended. The greatest officials of the State practised it
themselves. (If the Financial Statement isn't magic, I
don't know what is.) Then, to encourage him further, I
said that, if there was ^xiyjadoo afoot, I had not the least
objection to giving it my countenance and sanction, and
to seeing that it was clean jadoo — white magic, as dis-
tinguished from the unclean jadoo which kills folk. It
took a long time before Suddh :)o admitted that this was
just what he had asked me to come for. Then he told me,
in jerks and quavers, that the man who said he cut seals
was a sorcerer of the cleanest kind; that every day he
gave Suddhoo news of the sick son in Peshawar more
quickly than the lightning could fly, and that this new*

ISO PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

was always corroborated by the letters. Further, that he
had told Suddhoo how a great danger was threatening his
son, which could be removed by clean jadoo; and, of
course, heavy payment. I saw exactly how the land lay,
and told Suddhoo that I also imderstood a MttlQ jadoo in
the Western line, and would go to his house to see that
everything was done decently and in order. We set off
together; and on the way Suddhoo told me that he had
already paid the seal-cutter between one hundred and
two hundred rupees, and the jadoo of that night would
cost two hundred more. This was cheap, he said, con-
sidering the greatness of his son's danger; but I do not
think he meant it.

The Hghts were all cloaked in the front of the house
when we came. I could hear awful noises from behind the
seal-cutter's shop-front, as though some one were groan-
ing his soul out. Suddhoo shook all over, and while v/e
groped our way upstairs told me that the jadoo had begun.
Janoo and Azizun met us at the stair-head, and told us
that thejadoo-work would take place in their rooms, be-
cause there was more space there. Janoo is a lady of a
freethinking turn of mind. She whispered that the jadoo
was an invention to get money out of Suddhoo, and that
the seal-cutter would go to a hot place when he died.
Suddhoo was nearly crying with fear and old age. He
walked up and down the room in the half-light, repeating
his son's name over and over again, and asking Azizun if
the seal-cutter should not make a reduction in the case of
his own landlord. Janoo pulled me over to the shadow in
the recess of the carved bow-windows. The boards were
up and the rooms were only lit by one tiny oil-lamp.
There was no chance of my being seen if I stayed still.

IN THE HOUSE OF SUDDHOO 151

Presently, the groans below ceased, and we heard steps
on the staircase. That was the seal-cutter. He stopped
outside the door as the terrier barked and Azizun fumbled
at the chain, and he told Suddhoo to blow out the lamp.
This left the place in jet darkness, except for the red glow
from the two huqas that belonged to Janoo and Azizun.
The seal-cutter came in, and I heard Suddhoo throw him-
self down on the floor and groan. Azizun caught her
breath, and Janoo backed on to one of the beds with a
shudder. There was a clink of something metallic, and
then shot up a pale blue-green flame near the ground.
The light was just enough to show Azizun, pressed
against one comer of the room with the terrier between
her knees; Janoo with her hands clasped, leaning for-
ward as she sat on the bed; Suddhoo, face down, quiver-
ing, and the seal-cutter.

I hope I may never see another man like that seal-
cutter. He was stripped to the waist, with a wreath
of white jasmine as thick as my wrist round his fore-
head, a salmon-coloured loin-cloth round his middle,
and a steel bangle on each ankle. This was not awe-
inspiring. It was the face of the man that turned me
cold. It was blue-gray, in the first place. In the
second, the eyes were rolled back tiU you could only
see the whites of them; and, in the third, the face was
the face of a demon — a ghoul — anything you please
except of the sleek, oily old ruffian who sat in the day-
time over his turning-lathe downstairs. He was lying
on his stomach with his arms turned and crossed be-
hind him, as if he had been thrown down pinioned.
His head and neck were the only parts of him off the
floor. They were neaxly at right angles to the bodyj

15» PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

like the head of a cobra at spring. It was ghastly.
In the centre of the room, on the bare earth floor, stood
a big, deep, brass basin, with a pale blue-green Hght
floating in the centre Hke a night-light. Roui.d that
basin the man on the floor wriggled nimself three times.
How he did it I do not know. I could see the muscles
ripple along his spine and fall smooth again; but I could
not see any other motion. The head seemed the only
thing aHve about him, except that slow curl and uncurl
of the labouring back-muscles. Janoo from the bed
was breathing seventy to the minute; Azizun held her
hands before her eyes; and old Suddhoo, fingering at the
dirt that had got into his white beard, was crying to
himself. The horror of it was that the creeping, crawly
thing made no sound — only crawled! And, remember,
this lasted for ten minutes, wliiie the terrier whined, and
Azizun shuddered, and Janoo gasped, and Suddhoo cried.
I felt the hair Uft at the back of my head, and my
heart thump like a thermantidote paddle. Luckily, the
seal-cutter betrayed himself by his most impressive
trick and made me calm again. After he had finished
that unspeakable triple crawl, he stretched his head
away from the floor as high as he could, and sent out
a jet of fire from his nostrils. Now I knew how fire-
spouting is done — I can do it myself — so I felt at ease.
The business was a fraud. If he had only kept to that
crawl without trying to raise the effect, goodness knows
what I might not have thought. Both the girls shrieked
at the jet of fire and the head dropped, chin-down on the
floor, with a thud; the whole body lying then Hke a
corpse with its arms trussed. There was a pause of five
full minutes after this, and the blue-green flame died

IN THE HOUSE OF SUDDHOO XS|

down. Janoo stooped to settle one of her anklets, while
Azizun turned her face to the wall and took the terrier
in her arms. Suddhoo put out an arm mechanically
to Janoo's huqa, and she sHd it across the floor with her
foot. Directly above the body and on the wall, were a
a couple of flaming portraits, in stamped-paper frames, of
the Queen and the Prince of Wales. They looked down
on the performance, and to my thinking, seemed to
heighten the grotesqueness of it all.

Just when the silence was getting imendurable, the
body turned over and rolled away from the basin to
the side of the room, where it lay stomach-up. There
was a faint 'plop^ from the basin — exactly like the
noise a fish makes when it takes a fly — and the green
light in the centre revived.

I looked at the basin, and saw, bobbing in the water,
the dried, shrivelled, black head of a native baby —
open eyes, open mouth, and shaved scalp. It was worse,
being so very sudden, than the crawling exhibition.
We had no time to say anything before it began to speak.

Read Poe's account of the voice that came from the
mesmerised dying man, and you will realise less than
one-half of the horror of that head's voice.

There was an interval of a second or two between
each word, and a sort of 'ring, ring, ring,' in the note
of the voice, like the timbre of a bell. It pealed slowly,
as if talking to itself, for several minutes before I got
rid of my cold sweat. Then the blessed solution struck
me. I looked at the body lying near the doorway, and
saw, just where the hollow of the throat joins on the
shoulders, a muscle that had nothing to do with any
man's regular breathing twitching away steadily. The

154 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

whole thing was a careful reproduction of the Egyptian
teraphin that one reads about sometimes; and the voice
was as clever and as appalling a piece of ventriloquism
as one could wish to hear. All this time the head was
4ip-lip-lapping' against the side of the basin, and speak-
ing. It told Suddhoo, on his face again whining, of his
son's ilhiess and of the state of the illness up to the eve-
ning of that very night. I always shall respect the seal-
cutter for keeping so faithfully to the time of the Pesh-
awar telegrams. It went on to say that skilled doctors
were night and day watching over the man's Ufe; and
that he would eventually recover if the fee to the potent
sorcerer, whose servant was the head in the basin, were
doubled.

Here the mistake from the artistic point of view
came in. To ask for twice your stipulated fee in a
voice that Lazarus might have used when he rose from,
the dead, is absurd. Janoo, who is really a woman of
mascuHne intellect, saw this as quickly as I did. I heard
her say ^Asli nahin! Fareib T scornfully under her
breath; and just as she said so, the light in the basin died
out, the head stopped talking, and we heard the room
door creak on its hinges. Then Janoo struck a match,
lit the lamp, and we saw that head, basin, and seal-cutter
were gone. Suddhoo was wringing his hands and ex-
plaining to any one who cared to listen, that, if his chance
of eternal salvation depended on it, he could not raise
another two hundred rupees. Azizun was nearly in
hysterics in the corner, while Janoo sat down composedly
on one of the beds to discuss the probabiHties of the whole
thing being a bunao, or 'make-up.'

I explained as much as I knew of the seal-cutter's way

IN THE HOUSE OF SUDDHOO 155

of jadoo; but her argument was much more simple
— 'The magic that is always demanding gifts is no true
magic/ said she. 'My mother told me that the only
potent love-spells are those which are told you for love
This seal-cutter man is a liar and a devil. I dare not
tell, do anything, or get anything done, because I am in
debt to Bhagwan Dass the hunnia for two gold rings and
a heavy anklet. I must get my food from his shop.
The seal-cutter is the friend of Bhagwan Dass, and he
would poison my food. A iooVs jadoo has been going on
for ten days, and has cost Suddhoo many rupees each
night. The seal-cutter used black hens and lemons and
mantras before. He never showed us anything like
this till to-night. Azizun is a fool, and will be a purdah-
nashin soon. Suddhoo has lost his strength and his
wits. See now! I had hoped to get from Suddhoo
many rupees while he lived, and many more after his
death; and behold, he is spending everything on that
offspring of a devil and a she-ass, the seal-cutter!'

Here I said, 'But what induced Suddhoo to drag
me into the business? • Of course I can speak to the
seal-cutter, and he shall refund. The whole thing is
child's talk — shame — and senseless.'

'Suddhoo is an old child,' said Janoo. * He has lived
on the roofs these seventy years and is as senseless as a
milch-goat. He brought you here to assure himself
that he was not breaking any law of the Sirkar, whose
salt he ate many years ago. He worships the dust off
the feet of the seal-cutter, and that cow-devourer has for-
bidden him to go and see his son. What does Suddhoo
know of your laws or the lightning-post? I have to watch
his money going day by day to that lying beast below.'

1S6 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

Janoo stamped her foot on the floor and nearly cried
with vexation; while Suddhoo was whimpering under a
blanket in the corner, and Azizun was trying to guide
the pipe-stem to his fooUsh old mouth.

Now, the case stands thus. Unthinkingly, I have
laid myself open to the charge of aiding and abetting
the seal-cutter in obtaining money under false pre-
tences, which is forbidden by Section 420 of the Indian
Penal Code. I am helpless in the matter for these rea-
sons. I cannot inform the PoHce. What witnesses
would support my statements? Janoo refuses flatly,
and Azizun is a veiled woman somewhere near Bareilly—
lost in this big India of ours. I dare not again take ths
law into my own hands, and speak to the seal-cutter; for
certain am I that, not only would Suddhoo disbeheve
me, but this step would end in the poisoning of Janoo,
who is bound hand and foot by her debt to the bunnia.
Suddhoo is an old dotard; and whenever we meet mum-
bles my idiotic joke that the Sirkar rather patronises
the Black Art than otherwise. His son is well now; but
Suddhoo is completely under the influence of the seal-
cutter, by whose advice he regulates the aflairs of his Ufe.
Janoo watches daily the money that she hoped to
wheedle out of Suddhoo taken by the seal-cutter, and
becomes daily more furious and sullen.

She will never tell, because she dare not, but, unless
something happens to prevent her, I am afraid that the
seal-cutter will die of cholera — the white arsenic kind —
about the middle of May. And thus I shall be privy to
a murder in the House of Suddhoo.

HIS WEDDED WIFE

Cry 'Murder!' in the market-place, and each

Will turn upon his neighbour anxious eyes

That ask — 'Art thou the man?' We hunted Cain

Some centuries ago, across the world.

That bred the fear our own misdeeds maintain

To-day.

— ViharVs Moralities.

Shakespeare says something about worms, or it may
be giants or beetles, turning if you tread on them too
severely. The safest plan is never to tread on a worm
— not even on the last new subaltern from Home J with:
his4)uttons- hardly out-oLtheir tissue-rpapeivand tke-red
of-sappy"€n§Usb-boof in-hi-s^xfaeeks. This is a story of
the worm that turned. For the sake of brevity, we will
call Henry Augustus Ramsay Faizanne, ^The Worm,'
though he really was an exceedingly pretty boy, without
a hair on his face, and with a waist like a girl's, when he
came out to the Second 'Shikarris' and was made un-
happy in several ways. The 'Shikarris' are a high-caste
regiment, and you must be able to do things well — ^play
a banjo, or ride more than little, or sing, or act — to get
on with them.

The Worm did nothing but fall off his pony and knock
chips out of gate-posts with his trap. EVen that became
monotonous afterrrtime. He objected to whist, cut the
cloth at billiards, sang out of tune, kept very much to

IS7

rs8 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

himself, and wrote to his Mamma and sisters at Home.
Four of these five things were vices which the *Shikarris'
objected to and set themselves to eradicate. .Everjrone
knows how^sybal±£rns__are, by brother subalterns, soft-
ened and not permitted to be ferocious. It is good and
wholesom-e,- and- doesujoo-jcuie -any -harm, unlcs^T^In^ers
are lost; and then there is trouble. There was a man
once —

The ^Shikarris' shikarred The Worm very much,
and he bore everything without winking. He was so
good and so anxious to learn, and flushed so pink, that
his education was cut short, and he was left to his own
devices by every one except the Senior Subaltern, who
continued to make Hfe a burden to The Worm. The
Senior Subaltern meant no harm; but his chaffy was

coarse P>tTnf4-^t4»,jdirlr)'t qm'te ur>rlprqia.TKl vfheve tO Stop.

He had been waiting too long for his Company; and
that always sours a man. Also he was in love, which
made him worse.

One day, after he had borrowed The Worm's trap for
a lady who never existed, had used it himself all the
afternoon, had sent a note to The Worm, purporting
to come from the lady, and was telHng the Mess all
about it. The Worm rose in his place and said, in his
'quietj_lady-like jvoice — 'That was a very pretty sell;
but I'll lay you a month's pay to a month's pay when
you get your step, that I work a sell on you that you'll
remember for the rest of your days, and the Regiment
after you when you're dead or broke.' The Worm
wasn't angry in the least, and the rest of the Mess
shouted. Then the Senior Subaltern looked at The
Worm from the boots upwards, and down again, and

fflS WEDDED WIFE 159

said—' Done, Baby.' The Worm held the rest of the
Mess to witness that the bet had been taken, and retired
into a book with a sweet smile.

Two months passed, and the Senior Subaltern still
educated The Worm, Who^beg^n to-jaeve-abe^it-a4k-tle
tfnore-a-s-tbe- hot weather came on. I have said that
the Senior Subaltern was in love. The curious thing
is that a girl was in love with the Senior Subaltern.
Though the Colonel said awful things, and the Majors
snorted, and the married Captains looked unutterable
wisdom, an4-feho-J4Hiiors scoffed, those two were engaged.

The Senior Subaltern was so pleased with getting
his Company and his acceptance at the same time that
he forgot to bother The Worm. The girl was a pretty
girl, and had money of her own. She does not come
into this story at all.

One night, at the beginning of the hot weather, all
the Mess, except The Worm who had gone to his own
room to write Home letters, were sitting on the plat-
form outside the Mess House. The-Band-had -fini^ed
playing,, but TiQ-rmp wanted to pro-in. And the Cap-
tains' wives were there also. The folly of a man in
love is unlimited. The Senior Subaltern had been
holding forth on the merits of the girl he was engaged
to, and the ladies were purring approval while the men
yawned, when there was a rustle of skirts in the dark,
and a tired, faint voice Hfted itself.

^Where's my husband?'

I do not wish in the least to reflect on the morality
of the 'Shikarris'; but it is on record that four men
jumped up as if they had been shot. Thr^e of them
wefe^laarried-ffie^h— P^rhaDS^ they were afraid that

i6o PLMN TALES FROM THE HlLLS

TTieir wives had 'coi!ir~frDT!rTIome unbeknownst. The
ftttixh. said that he had^"acfed~oirihe"impuIse~bf the
n^oiaeftt: — He-eAplaiiied IhisTcfterwards.

Then the voice cried, '0 Lionel!' Lionel was the
Senior Subaltern's name. A woman came into the little
circle of light by the candles on the peg-tables, stretching
out her hands to the dark where the Senior Subaltern was,
and sobbing. We rose to our feet, feeling that things
were going to happen and ready to believe the v/orst.
^n.thiG bad7-sma4Lworld-jo£--oufSr-^fl:^kiTaw5~5Q' littte~uf

tjxeJif-r nf thrv^iieyt TTieT]33Khi£lv.^teF^,-4s entirely his

owft-concern — 4har onQ-io not guipfSeS^hen a crash
comes. Anythingmigh^-^UKar-ufi-aayi day for an3r-Qft€.
Perhaps the Senior Subaltern had been trapped in his
youth. Men are crippled that way occasionally. We .
didn't know; we wanted to hear; aa^4-4he -Captaias^
wives were a»-aRxious as,.we. If he had been trapped, he
was to be excused; for the woman from nowhere, in
the dusty shoes and gray travelling-dress, was very
lovely, with black hair and great eyes full of tears. Sbtf^
was tall, with a £LiTrfigufe7"and her voice had-arrmiging
sobinrit-fjitifnttTrfeear. As soon as the Senior Subaltern
stood up, she threw her arms around his neck, and
called him ^my darling,' and said she could not bear
waiting alone in England, and his letters were so short
and cold, and she was his to the end of the world, jind
would he forgive her? This did uGt sound quite like a
lady'^-way-ef-speaking. It^aLaS-too-^^niuiltlitraliVe.

Things seemed black indeed, and the Captains' wives
peered under their eyebrows at the Senior Subaltern, and^
tha-Colond's face-set-like tha-Day of JudgmeoHrafllgd
in gray bristles, and no one opokc for a while.

HIS WEDDED WIFE i6t

Next the Colonel said, very shortly, 'Well, Sir?'
and the woman sobbed afresh. The Senior Subaltern
was half choked with the arms round his neck, but he
gasped out — 'It's a darned He! I never had a wife in
my life!' — 'Don't swear,' said— the~ Coloftel^ 'Come
into the Mess. We must sift this clear somehow,*
and he sighed to himself, for he beheved in his 'Shi-
karris,' did the Colonel.

We trooped into the ante-room, under the full lights,
and there we saw how beautiful the woman was. She
stood up in the middle of us all, sometimes choking
with crying, then hard and proud, and then holding
out her arms to the Senior Subaltern. '*t-was4&e-the
^nrth ^^^ ^^ ^ trn^^rly She told us how the Senior
Subaltern had married her when he was Home on leave
eighteen months before; aQ4-^hQ_-seeiii!cd-^te-kn^w=°ftll
that we ■kfl:ew-,-aBd-jaor€-4Qa,-jo£4ik--peepk~aa4-his-y
•4ifc: He was white and ashy-gray, trying now and
again to break into the torrent of her words; and we,
noting how lovely she was and what a criminal he looked,
esteemed him a beast of the worst kind. We~fdt-sea;y
foTinmpfehQUgli,

I shall never forget the indictment of the Senior
Subaltern by his wife. Nor will he. It was so sud-
den, rushing eiXL^d- the dark, unannounced, into our
dull lives. The Captains' wives stood back; but their
eyes were alight, and you could see that they had al-
ready convicted and sentenced the Senior Subaltern.
The Colonel seemed five years older, (kie ^MajerT^nas
sbadjfigjaifr-eyes with-hip hand nnd ^vatcliing the woman
^froiSLJinderiiealli it. Another was ehewifig-hisr-inotls^^
tache andjmiling quietly as if he were, witnessing^arplay.

i62 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

iMUm^he open space 4flr-^b€-.€^»tf€rb3Hiie whlsL la-bles,
tbe-StmiSr SubdtojjIsLJ^mer- was himtmg-4eg-<^as.
I remember all this as clearly as though a photograph
were in my hand. I remember the look of horror on the
Senior Subaltern's face. • It was rather like seeing a man
hanged; but much more interesting. Finally, the
woman wound up by saying that the Senior Subaltern
carried a double F. M. in tattoo on his left shoulder. We
all knew that, and to our innocent minds it ^emed to
clinch the matter. But one of the bachelor Majors said
very politely, 'I presume that your marriage-certificate
would be more to the purpose? '

That roused the woman. She s,tood up and sneered
at the Senior Subaltern for a cur, and abused the Majoi
and the Colonel and all the rest. Then she wept,
and then she pulled a paper from her breast, say-
ing imperially, 'Take that! And let my husband—
my lawfully wedded husband — read it aloud — if he
dare!'

There was a hush, and the men looked into each
other's eyes as the Senior Subaltern came forward in a
dazed and dizzjj^^^way, and took the paper. W^^:^f^e
TVondernTg7^a:5:~we-5tared, whether thertr waa-aa^dilia^
against uny^one of-us that might turiuiip later oik_ The
Senior SubalternJs throat was dry; but, as he ran his eye
over the paper, he broke out into a hoarse cackle of re-
lief, and said to the woman, 'You young blackguard!'
But the woman had fled through a door, and on the
paper was written, 'This is to certify that I, The Worm.
have paid in full my debts to the Senior Subaltern,- and,
further, that the Senior Subaltern is my debtor, by agree ■
ment on the 23d of February, as by the Mess attested, to

fflS WEDDED WIFE 163

the extent of one month's Captain's pay, in the lawful
currency of the Indian Empire.'"/

Then a deputation set off for The Worm's quarters and
found him, betwixt and between, unlacing his stays, with
the hat, wig, and serge dress, on the bed. He came over as
he was, and the * Shikarris ' shouted till the Gunners' Mess
sent over to know if they might have a share of the fun. I
think we were all, except the Colonel and the Senior Sub-
altern, a little disappointed that the scandal had come to
nothing. But that is human nature. There could be no
two words about The Worm's acting. It leaned as near
to a nasty tragedy as anything this side of a joke can.
When most of the Subalterns sat upon him with sofa-
cushions to find out why he had not said that acting was
his strong point, he answered very quietly, ' I don't think
you ever asked me. I used to act at Home with my
sisters.' But no acting with girls could account for The
Worm's display that night. Personally, I think it was in
bad taste. Besides being dangerous. There is no sort of
use in playing with fire, even for fun.

The ' Shikarris ' made him President of the Regimental
Dramatic Club; and, when the Senior Subaltern paid up
his debt, which he did at once. The Worm sank the money
in scenery and dresses. He was a good Worm; and the
* Shikarris ' are proud of him. The only drawback is that
he has been christened 'Mrs. Senior Subaltern'; and, as
there are now two Mrs. Senior Subalterns in the Station,
this is sometimes confusing to strangers.

Later on, I will tell you of a case something like this, but
with aU the jest left out and nothing in it but real trouble.

THE BROKEN-LINK HANDICAP

While the snaffle holds, or the long-neck stings,
While the big beam tilts, or the last bell rings,
While horses are horses to train and to race,
Then women and wine take a second place

For me — for me —

While a short * ten- three *
Has a field to squander or fence to face!

— Song of the G. R.

There are more ways of running a horse to suit your book
than pulling his head off in the straight. Some men for-
get this. Understand clearly that all racing is rotten — as
everything connected with losing money must be. In
India, in addition to its inherent rottenness, it has the
merit of being two-thirds sham; looking pretty on paper
only. Every one knows every one else far too well for
business purposes. How on earth can you rack and harry
and post a man for his losings, when you are fond of his
wife, and live in the same Station with him? He says,
* On the Monday following,' ' I can't settle just yet.' You
say, 'All right, old man,' and think yourself lucky if you
pull off nine hundred out of a two-thousand-rupee debt.
Any way you look at it, Indian racing is immoral, and ex-
pensively immoral. Which is much worse. If a man
wants your money, he ought to ask for it, or send round a
subscription-list, instead of juggling about the country,
with an Australian larrikin; a 'brumby,' with as much

164

THE BROKEN-LINK HANDICAP 165

breed as the boy; a brace of chumars in gold-laced caps;
three or four ekka-pomes with hogged manes, and a
switch-tailed demirep of a mare called Arab because she
has a kink in her flag. Racing leads to the shroff quicker
than anything else. But if you have no conscience and
no sentiments, and good hands, and some knowledge of
pace, and ten years' experience of horses, and several
thousand rupees a month, I beUeve that you can occasion-
ally contrive to pay your shoeing-bills.

Did you ever know Shackles — b. w. g., 15. if — coarse,
loose, mule-like ears — barrel as long as a gate-post — tough
as a telegraph-wire — and the queerest brute that ever
looked through a bridle? He was of no brand, being one
of an ear-nicked mob taken into the Bucephalus at £4:ios.
a head to make up freight, and sold raw and out of con-
dition at Calcutta for Rs. 275. People who lost money
on him. called him a 'brumby, ' but if ever any horse had
Harpoon's shoulders and The Gin's temper, Shackles was
that horse. Two miles was his own particular distance.
He trained himself, ran himself, and rode himself; and, if
his jockey insulted him by giving him hints, he shut up at
once and bucked the boy off. He objected to dictation.
Two or three of his owners did not understand this, and
lost money in consequence. At last he was bought by a
man who discovered that, if a race was to be won,
Shackles, and Shackles only, would win it in his own way,
so long as his jockey sat still. This man had a riding-boy
called Brunt — a lad from Perth, West AustraHa — and he
taught Brunt, with a trainer's whip, the hardest thing a
jock can learn — to sit still, to sit still, and to keep on
sitting still. When Brimt fairly grasped this truth,
Shackles devastated the country. No weight could stop

:^J PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

iiim at his own distance; and the fame of Shackles spread
trom Ajmir in the South, to Chedputter in the North.
There was no horse like Shackles, so long as he was allowed
to do his work in his own way. But he was beaten in the
end; and the story of his fall is enough to make angels
weep.

At the lower end of the Chedputter race-course, just
before the turn into the straight, the track passes close to
a couple of old brick-mounds enclosing a funnel-shaped
hollow. The big end of the funnel is not six feet from the
railings on the off-side. The astounding peculiarity of
the course is that, if you stand at one particular place,
about haK a mile away, inside the course, and speak at
ordinary pitch, your voice just hits the funnel of the
brick-mounds and makes a curious whining echo there. A
man discovered this one morning by accident while out
training with a friend. He marked the place to stand and
speak from with a couple of bricks, and he kept his knowl-
edge to himself. Every peculiarity of a course is worth re-
membering in a country where rats play the mischief with
the elephant-litter, and Stewards build jumps to suit
their own stables. This man ran a very fairish country-
bred, a long, racking high mare with the temper of a fiend,
and the paces of an airy wandering seraph — a drifty,
glidy stretch. The mare was, as a delicate tribute to
Mrs. Reiver, called 'The Lady Regula Baddun'— or, for
short, Regula Baddun.

Shackles' jockey. Brunt, was a quite well-behaved boy,
but his nerve had been shaken. He began his career by
riding jump-races in Melbourne, where a few Stewards
want lynching, and was one of the jockeys who came
through the awful butchery— perhaps you will recollect it

THE BROKEN-LINK HANDICAP ' 167

— of the Maribyrnong Plate. The walls were colonial
ramparts — logs of jarrah spiked into masonry — with
wings as strong as Church buttresses. Once in his stride,
a horse had to jump or fall. He couldn't run out. In the
Maribyrnong Plate, twelve horses were jammed at the
second wall. Red Hat, leading, fell this side, and threw
out The Gled, and the ruck came up behind and the space
between wing and wing was one struggling, screaming,
kicking shambles. Four jockeys were taken out dead;
three were very badly hurt, and Brunt was among the
three. He told the story of the Maribyrnong Plate
sometimes; and when he described how WTialley on Red
Hat said, as the mare fell under him — ' God ha' mercy,
I'm done for!' and how, next instant, Si thee There and
White Otter had crushed the life out of poor Whalley,
and the dust hid a small hell of men and horses, no one
marvelled that Brunt had dropped jump-races and
Australia together. Regula Baddun's owner knew that
story by heart. Brunt never varied it in the teUing. He
had no education.

Shackles came to the Chedputter Autumn races one
year, and his owner walked about insulting the sportsmen
of Chedputter generally, till they went to the Honorary
Secretary in a body and said, 'Appoint handicappers, and
arrange a race which shall break Shackles and humble the
pride of his owner.' The Districts rose against Shackles
and sent up of their best: Ousel, who was supposed to be
able to do his mile in 1-53 ; Petard, the stud-bred, trained
by a cavalry regiment who knew how to train; Gringalet,
the ewe-lamb of the 75th; Bobolink, the pride of Pesha-
war; and many others.

They called that race the Broken-Link Handicap, be-

i68 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

cause it was to smash Shackles; and the Handicappers
piled on the weights, and the Fund gave eight hundred
rupees, and the distance was 'round the course for all
horses.' Shackles' owner said, 'You can arrange the race
with regard to Shackles only. So long as you don't bury
him under weight-cloths, I don't mind.' Regula Bad-
dun's owner said, ' I throw in my mare to fret Ousel. Six
furlongs is Regula 's distance, and she will then He down
and die. So also will Ousel, for his jockey doesn't under-
stand a waiting race.' Now, this was a lie, for Regula
had been in work for two months at Dehra, and her
chances were good, always supposing that Shackles broke
a blood-vessel — or Brunt moved on him.

The plunging in the lotteries was fine. They filled
eight thousand-rupee lotteries on the Broken-Link Handi-
cap, and the account in the Pioneer said that 'favouritism
was divided.' In plain English, the various contingents
were wild on their respective horses; for the Handi-
cappers had done their work well. The Honorary Secre-
tary shouted himself hoarse through the din; and the
smoke of the cheroots was like the smoke, and the rattling
of the dice-boxes like the rattle of small-arm fire.

Ten horses started — very level — and Regula Baddun's
owner cantered out on his hack to a place inside the
circle of the course, where two bricks had been thrown.
He faced towards the brick-mounds at the lower end of
the course and waited.

The story of the running is in the Pioneer. At the end
of the first mile. Shackles crept out of the ruck, well on the
outside, ready to get round the turn, lay hold of the bit
and spin up the straight before the others knew he had
got away. Brunt was sitting still, perfectly happy, listen-

THE BROKEN-LINK HANDICAP 169

ing to the Mrum-drum-drum ' of the hoofs behind, and
knowing that, in about twenty strides. Shackles would
draw one deep breath and go up the last half-mile like the
* Flying Dutchman.' As Shackles went short to take the
turn, and came abreast of the brick-mound. Brunt heard,
above the noise of the wind in his ears, a whining,
waiUng voice on the off-side, saying — ' God ha' mercy, I'm
done for!' In one stride. Brunt saw the whole seething
smash of the Maribyrnong Plate before him, started in
his saddle and gave a yell of terror. The start brought
the heels into Shackles' side, and the scream hurt
Shackles' feelings. He couldn't stop dead; but he put
out his feet and slid along for fifty yards, and then, very
gravely and judicially, bucked off Brunt — a shaking,
terror-stricken lump, while Regula Baddun made a neck-
and-neck race with BoboHnk up the straight, and won by
a short head — Petard a bad third. Shackles' owner, in the
Stand, tried to think that his field-glasses had gone wrong.
Regula Baddun's owner, waiting by the two bricks, gave
one deep sigh of relief, and cantered back to the Stand.
He had won, in lotteries and bets, about fifteen thousand.
It was a Broken-Link Handicap with a vengeance. It
broke nearly all the men concerned, and nearly broke the
heart of Shackles' owner. He went down to interview
Brunt. The boy lay, Hvid and gasping with fright, where
he had tumbled off. The sin of losing the race never
seemed to strike him. All he knew was that Whalley had
'called' him, that the 'call' was a warning; and, were he
cut in two for it, he would never get up again. His nerve
had gone altogether, and he only asked his master to give
him a good thrashing, and let him go. He was fit for
nothing, he said. He got his dismissal, and crept up to

I70 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

the paddock, white as chalk, with blue lips, his knees giv-
'ng way under him. People said nasty things in the pad-
dock; but Brunt never heeded. He changed into tweeds,
took his stick and went down the road, still shaking with
fright, and muttering over and over again — 'God ha'
mercy, I'm done for ! ' To the best of my knowledge and
belief he spoke the truth.

So now you know how the Broken-Link Handicap
was run and won. Of course you don't believe it.
You would credit anything about Russia's designs on
India, or the recommendations of the Currency Com-
mission; but a little bit of sober fact is more than you
can stand.

BEYOND THE PALE

Love needs not caste nor sleep a broken bed. I went in search of love
and lost myself. — Hindu Proverb,

A Man should, whatever happens, keep to his own
caste, race and breed. Let the White go to the White
and the Black to the Black. Then, whatever trouble
falls is in the ordinary course of things — neither sudden,
aUen nor unexpected.

This is the story of a man who wilfully stepped beyond
the safe limits of decent everyday society, and paid for
it heavily.

He knew too much in the first instance; and he saw
too much in the second. He took too deep an interest
in native life; but he will never do so again.

Deep away in the heart of the City, behind Jitha
Megji's bustee, lies Amir Nath's Gully, which ends in a
dead-wall pierced by one grated window. At the head
of the Gully is a big cowbyre, and the walls on either
side of the Gully are without windows. Neither Suchet
Singh nor Gaur Chand approve of their women-folk
looking into the world. If Durga Charan had been of
their opinion, he would have been a happier man to-day,
and little Bisesa would have been able to knead her
own bread. Her room looked out through the grated
window into the narrow dark Gully where the sun
never came and where the buffaloes wallowed in the

171

172 PLAIN TALES FROM THE filLLS

blue slime. She was a widow, fifteen years old, and she
prayed the Gods, day and night, to send her a lover; for
she did not approve of Hving alone.

One day, the man — Trejago was his name — came
into Amir Nath's Gully on a wandering; and, after he
had passed the buffaloes, stumbled over a big heap of
cattle-food.

Then he saw that the Gully ended in a trap, and
heard a little laugh from behind the grated window.
It was a pretty Httle laugh, and Trejago, knowing that,
for all practical purposes, the old Arabian Nights are
good guides, went forward to the window, and whispered
that verse of 'The Love Song of Har Dyal' which be-
gins:—

Can a man stand upright in the face of the naked Sun; or a Lover in
the Presence of his Beloved?

If my feet fail me, O Heart of my Heart, am I to blame, being
blinded by the glimpse of your beauty?

There came the faint tchink of a woman's bracelets
from behind the grating, and a little voice went on with
the song at the fifth verse : —

Alas! alas! Can the Moon tell the Lotus of her love when the Gate
of Heaven is shut and the clouds gather for the rains?

They have taken my Beloved, and driven her with the pack horses to
the North.

There are iron chains on the feet that were set on my heart.

Call to the bowmen to make ready

The voice stopped suddenly, and Trejago walked
out of Amir Nath's Gully, wondering who in the world
could have capped 'The Love Song of Har Dyal' so
neatly.

BEYOND THE PALE 173

Next morning, as he was driving to office, an old
i\roman threw a packet into his dogcart. In the packet
was the half of a broken glass-bangle, one flower of the
blood-red dhak^ a pinch of hhusa or cattle-food, and
eleven cardamoms. That packet was a letter — not a
clumsy compromising letter, but an innocent unintel-
ligible lover's epistle.

Trejago knew far too much about these things, as I
have said. No Englishman should be able to translate
object-letters. But Trejago spread all the trifles on the
lid of his office-box and began to puzzle them out.

A broken glass-bangle stands for a Hindu widow all
India over; because, when her husband dies, a woman's
bracelets are broken on her wrists. Trejago saw the
meaning of the little bit of the glass. The flower of
the dhak means diversely 'desire,' 'come,' 'write,' or
'danger,' according to the other things with it. One
cardamom means 'jealousy'; but when any article is
dupHcated in an object-letter, it loses its s)anbolic
meaning and stands merely for one of a number indi-
cating time, or, if incense, curds, or saffron be sent also,
place. The message ran then — 'A widow — dhak flower
and hhusa, — at eleven o'clock.' The pinch of hhusa
enhghtened Trejago. He saw — this kind of letter
leaves much to instinctive knowledge — that the hhusa
referred to the big heap of cattle-food over which
he had fallen in Amir Nath's GuUy, and that the mes-
sage must come from the person behind the grating; she
being a widow. So the message ran then — 'A widow,
in the Gully in which is the heap of hhusa, desires you
to come at eleven o'clock.'

Trejago threw all the rubbish into the fireplace and

174 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

laughed. He knew that men in the East do not make
love under windows at eleven in the forenoon, nor do
women fix appointments a week in advance. So he
went, that very night at eleven, into Amir Nath's
Gully, clad in a boorka, which cloaks a man as well as
a woman. Directly the gongs of the City made the
hour, the little voice behind the grating took up 'The
Love Song of Har Dyal' at the verse where the Pan-
than girl calls upon Har Dyal to return. The song is
really pretty in the Vernacular. In EngUsh you miss
the wail of it. It runs something like this —

Alone upon the housetops, to the North
I turn and watch the lightning in the sky, —

The glamour of thy footsteps in the North,
Come back to me^ Beloved, or I die!

Below my feet the still bazar is laid,

Far, far, below the weary camels lie, —
The camels and the captives of thy raid.

Come back to me, Beloved, or I die!

My father's wife is old and harsh with years,
And drudge of all my father's house am I. —

My bread is sorrow and my drink is tears,
Come back to me, Beloved, or I die!

As the song stopped, Trejago stepped up under the
grating and whispered — 'I am here.^

Bisesa was good to look upon.

That night was the beginning of many strange things,
and of a double life so wild that Trejago to-day some-
times wonders if it were not all a dream. Bisesa, or
her old handmaiden who had thrown the object-letter,

BEYOND THE PALE 175

had detached the heavy grating from the brick-work of
the wall; so that the window slid inside, leaving only
a square of raw masonry into which an active man
might climb.

In the day-time, Trejago drove through his routine
of office-work, or put on his calling-clothes and called
on the ladies of the Station; wondering how long they
would know him if they knew of poor little Bisesa.
At night, when all the City was still, came the walk
under the evil-smelling boorka, the patrol through Jitha
Megji's bustee, the quick turn into Amir Nath's Gully
between the sleeping cattle and the dead walls, and
then, last of all, Bisesa, and the deep, even breathing
of the old woman who slept outside the door of the
bare little room that Durga Charan allotted to his
sister's daughter. Who or what Durga Charan was,
Trejago never inquired; and why in the world he was
not discovered and knifed never occurred to him till
his madness was over, and Bisesa . . . But this
comes later.

Bisesa was an endless delight to Trejago. She was
as ignorant as a bird; and her distorted versions of the
rumours from the outside world that had reached her
in her room, amused Trejago almost as much as her
lisping attempts to pronounce his name — ^Christopher.'
The first syllable was always more than she could man-
age, and she made funny little gestures with her rose-
leaf hands, as one throwing the name away, and then,
kneeling before Trejago asked him, exactly as an Eng-
lishwoman would do, if he were sure he loved her.
Trejago swore that he loved her more than any one else
m the world. Which was true.

176 PLAIN TALES FROM THE fflLLS

After a month of this folly, the exigencies of his
other life compelled Trejago to be especially attentive
to a lady of his acquaintance. You may take it for a
fact that anything of this kind is not only noticed and
discussed by a man's own race but by some hundred
and fifty natives as well. Trejago had to w^alk with
this lady and talk to her at the Band stand, and once
or twice to drive with her; never for an instant dream-
ing that this would affect his dearer, out-of-the-way
life. But the news flew, in the usual mysterious fash-
ion, from mouth to mouth, till Bisesa's duenna heard
of it and told Bisesa. The child was so troubled that
she did the household work evilly, and was beaten by
Durga Charan's v/ife in consequence.

A week later, Bisesa taxed Trejago with the flirta-
tion. She understood no gradations and spoke openly.
Trejago laughed and Bisesa stamped her little feet —
little feet, light as marigold flowers, that could lie in
the palm of a man's one hand.

Much that is written about Oriental passion and
impulsiveness is exaggerated and compiled at second-
hand, but a little of it is true; and when an EngUslmian
finds that little, it is quite as startling as any passion
in his own proper Hfe. Bisesa raged and stormed, and
finally threatened to kill herself if Trejago did not at
once drop the alien Memsahih who had come between
them. Trejago tried to explain, and to show her that
she did not understand these things from a Western
standpoint. Bisesa drew herself up, and said simply —

*I do not. I know only this — it is not good that
I should have made you dearer than my own heart to
me, Sahib, You are an Englishman. I am only a

BEYOND THE P.\LE 177

black girl' — she was fairer than bar-gold in the Mint,
— *and the widow of a black man.'

Then she sobbed and said — 'But on my soul and
my Mother's soul, I love you. There shall no harm
come to you, whatever happens to me.'

Trejago argued with the child, and tried to soothe
her, but she seemed quite imreasonably disturbed.
Nothing would satisfy her save that all relations be-
tween them should end. He was to go away at once.
And he went. As he dropped out of the window,
she kissed his forehead twice, and he walked home
wondering.

A week, and then three weeks, passed without a sign
from Bisesa. Trejago, thinking that the rupture had
lasted quite long enough, went down to Amir Nath's
Gully for the fifth time in the three weeks, hoping that
his rap at the sill of the shifting grating would be an-
swered. He was not disappointed.

There was a young moon, and one stream of light fell
down into Amir Nath's Gully, and struck the grating
which was drawn away as he knocked. From the black
dark, Bisesa held out her arms into the moonlight.
Both hands had been cut off at the wrists, and the
stumps were nearly healed.

Then, as Bisesa bowed her head between her arms and
sobbed, some one in the room gnmted like a wild beast,
and something sharp — knife, sword, or spear — thrust at
Trejago in his boorka. The stroke missed his body, but
cut into one of the muscles of the groin, and he limped
slightly from the wound for the rest of his days.

The grating slid into its place. There was no sign
whatever from inside the house, — nothing but the

178 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

moonlight strip on the high wall, and the blackness of
Amir Nath's Gully behind.

The next thing Trejago remembers, after raging and
shouting Hke a mad man between those pitiless walls,
is that he found himself near the river as the dawn
was breaking, threw away his boorka and went home
bareheaded.

What was the tragedy — whether Bisesa had, in a fit of
causeless despair, told everything, or the intrigue had
been discovered and she tortured to tell; whether Durga
Charan knew his name and what became of Bisesa — Tre-
jago does not know to this day. Something horrible had
happened, and the thought of what it must have been,
comes upon Trejago in the night now and again, and
keeps him company till the morning. One special
feature of the case is that he does not know where Hes the
front of Durga Charan's house. It may open on to a
courtyard common to two or more houses, or it may lie
behind any one of the gates of Jitha Megji's bustee. Tre-
jago cannot tell. He cannot get Bisesa — poor little
Bisesa — back again. He has lost her in the City where
each man's house is as guarded and as unknowable as the
grave; and the grating that opens into Amir Nath's Gully
has been walled up.

But Trejago pays his calls regularly, and is reckoned a
very decent sort of man.

There is nothing pecuHar about him, except a slight
stififness, caused by a riding-strain, in the right leg.

IN ERROR

They burnt a corpse upon the sand —

The light shone out afar;
It guided home the plunging boats

That beat from Zanzibar.
Spirit of Fire, where'er Thy altars rise,
Thou art Light of Guidance to our eyes!

— Salsette Boat-Song.

There is hope for a man who gets publicly and riotously
drunk more often than he ought to do; but there is no
hope for the man who drinks secretly and alone in his own
house — that man who is never seen to drinlc.

This is a rule; so there must be an exception to prove it.
Moriarty's case was that exception.

He was a Civil Engineer, and the Government, very
kindly, put him quite by himself in an out-district, with
nobody but natives to talk to and a great deal of work to
do. He did his work well in the four years he was utterly
alone; but he picked up the vice of secret and sohtary
drinking, and came up out of the wilderness more old and
worn and haggard than the dead-alive life had any right
to make him. You know the saying that a man who has
been alone in the jungle for more than a year is never
quite sane all his Kfe after. People credited Moriarty's
queerness of manner and moody ways to the soHtude, and
said that it showed how Government spoilt the futures of
its best men. Moriarty had built himself the plinth of a

179

i8o PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

very good reputation in the bridge-dam-girder line. But
he knew, every night of the week, that he was taking steps
to undermine that reputation with L. L. L. and Chris-
topher and little nips of liqueurs, and filth of that kind.
He had a sound constitution and a great brain, or else he
would have broken down and died Hke a sick camel in the
district. As better men have done before him.

Government ordered him to Simla after he had come
out of the desert; and he went up meaning to try for a post
then vacant. That season, Mrs. Reiver — perhaps you
will remember her — was in the height of her power, and
many men lay tmder her yoke. Everything bad that
could be said has already been said about Mrs. Reiver, in
mother tale. Moriarty was heavily built and handsome,
very quiet and nervously anxious to please his neighbours
when he wasn't sunk in a brown study. He started a
good deal at sudden noises or if spoken to without warn-
ing; and, when you watched him drinking his glass of
water at dinner, you could see the hand shake a httle.
But all this was put down to nervousness, and the quiet,
steady sip-sip-sip, fill and sip-sip-sip again that went on in
his own room when he was by himself, was never known.
Which was miraculous, seeing how everything in a man's
private life is pubHc property in India.

Moriarty was drawn, not into Mrs. Reiver's set, be-
cause they were not his sort, but into the power of Mrs.
Reiver, and he fell down in front of her and made a god-
dess of her. This was due to his coming fresh out of the
jungle to a big town. He could not scale things properly
or see who was what.

Because Mrs. Reiver was cold and hard, he said she
was stately and dignified. Because she had no brains,

IN ERROR i8i

and could not talk cleverly, he said she was resented and
shy. Mrs. Reiver shy! Because she was unworthy of
honour or reverence from any one, he reverenced her from
a distance and dowered her with all the virtues in the
Bible and most of those in Shakespeare.

This big, dark, abstracted man who was so nervous
when a pony cantered behind him, used to moon in the
train of Mrs. Reiver, blushing with pleasure when she
threw a word or two his way. His admiration was strictly
platonic; even other women saw and admitted this. He
did not move out in Simla, so he heard nothing against
his idol: which was satisfactory. Mrs. Reiver took no
special notice of him, beyond seeing that he was added to
her list of admirers, and going for a walk with him now
and then, just to show that he was her property, claim-
able as such. Moriarty must have done most of the talk-
ing, for Mrs. Reiver couldn't talk much to a man of his
stamp; and the little she said could not have been profit-
able. What Moriarty believed in, as he had good reason
to, was Mrs. Reiver's influence over him, and, in that be-
Hef , set himself seriously to try to do away with the vice
that only he himself knew of.

His experiences while he was fighting with it must have
been pecuHar, but he never described them. Sometimes
he would hold off from everything except water for a
week. Then, on a rainy night, when no one had asked
him out to dinner, and there was a big fire in his room,
and everything comfortable, he would sit down and make
a big night of it by adding little nip to little nip, planning
big schemes of reformation meanwhile, until he threw
himseh' on his bed hopelessly drunk. He suffered next
morning.

i82 PLAIN TALES FROM THE fflLLS

One night the big crash came. He was troubled in ys
own mind over his attempts to make himself Vorthy of
the friendship' of Mrs. Reiver. The past ten days had
been very bad ones, and the end of it all was that he re-
ceived the arrears of two and three quarter years of sipping
in one attack of delirium tremens of the subdued kind ; be-
ginning with suicidal depression, going on to fits and
starts and hysteria, and ending with downright raving.
As he sat in a chair in front of the fire, or walked up and
down the room picking a handkerchief to pieces, you
heard what poor Moriarty really thought of Mrs. Reiver,
for he raved about her and his own fall for the most part;
though he ravelled some P. W. D. accounts into the same
skein of thought. He talked and talked and talked in a
low dry whisper to himself, and there was no stopping
him. He seemed to know that there was something
wrong, and twice tried to pull himself together and con-
fer rationally with the Doctor; but his mind ran out of
control at once, and he fell back to a whisper and the story
of his troubles. It is terrible to hear a big man babbling
like a child of all that a man usually locks up, and puts
away in the deep of his heart. Moriarty read out his
very soul for the benefit of any one who was in the room
between ten-thirty that night and two-forty-five next
morning.

From what he said, one gathered how immense an in-
fluence Mrs. Reiver held over him, and how thoroughly
he felt for his own lapse. His whisperings cannot, of
course, be put down here; but they were very instructive
— as showing the errors of his estimates.

IN ERROR 183

When the trouble was over, and his few acquaintances
were pitying him for the bad attack of jungle-fever that
had so pulled him down, Moriarty swore a big oath to
himself and went abroad again with Mrs. Reiver till the
end of the season, adoring her in a quiet and deferential
way as an angel from heaven. Later on, he took to
riding — not hacking, but honest riding — which was good
proof that he was improving, and you could slam doors
behind him without his jumping to his feet with a gasp.
That, again, was hopeful.

How he kept his oath, and what it cost him in the be-
ginning, nobody knows. He certainly managed to com-
pass the hardest thing that a man who has drunk heavily
can do. He took his peg and wine at dinner ; but he never
drank alone, and never let what he drank have the least
hold on him.

Once he told a bosom-friend the story of his great
trouble, and how the ' influence of a pure honest woman,
and an angel as v/ell,' had saved him. When the man —
startled at anything good being laid to Mrs. Reiver's door
—laughed, it cost him Moriarty's friendship. Moriarty,
who is married now to a woman ten thousand times better
than Mrs. Reiver, — a woman who beHeves that there is
no man on earth as good and clever as her husband, — will
go down to his grave vowing and protesting that Mrs.
Reiver saved him from ruin in both worlds.

That she knew anything of Moriarty's weakness no-
body believed for a moment. That she would have cut
him dead, thrown him over, and acquainted all her friends
with her discovery, if she had known of it, nobody who
knew her doubted for an instant.

Moriarty thought her something she never was, and in

i84 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

that belief saved himself. Which was just as good as
though she had been ever3rthing that he had imagined.

But the question is, What claim will Mrs. Reiver have
to the credit of Moriarty's salvation, when her day of
reckoning comes?

A BANK FRAUD

Hr drank strong waters and his speech was coarse
He purchased raiment and forebore to pay;

He stuck a trusting junior with a horse,
And won Gjinkhanas in a doubtful way.

Then, 'twixt a vice and folly, turned aside

To do good deeds and straight to cloak them, lied.

— The Mess Room.

If Reggie Burke were in India now, he would resent
this tale being told; but as he is in Hongkong and won't
see it, the telling is safe. He was the man who worked
the big fraud on the Sind and Sialkote Bank. He
was manager of an up-country Branch, and a sound
practical man with a large experience of native loan
and insurance work. He could combine the frivolities
of ordinary Hfe with his work, and yet do well. Reggie
Burke rode anything that would let him get up, danced
as neatly as he rode, and was wanted for every sort of
amusement in the Station.

As he said himself, and as many men found out
rather to their surprise, there were two Burkes, both
very much at your service. * Reggie Burke,' between
four and ten, ready for anything from a hot-weather
gymkhana to a riding-picnic, and, between ten and four,
'Mr. Reginald Burke, Manager of the Sind and Sialkote
Branch Bank.' You might play polo with him one
afternoon and hear him express his opinions when a

i86 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

man crossed; and you might call on him next morning
to raise a two-thousand-rupee loan on a five-hundred-
pound insurance policy, eighty pounds paid in premiums.
He would recognise you, but you would have some
trouble in recognising him.

The Directors of the Bank — it had its headquarters
in Calcutta and its General Manager's word carried
weight with the Government — picked their men well.
They had tested Reggie up to a fairly severe breaking-
strain. They trusted him just as much as Directors
ever trust Managers. You must see for yourself whether
their trust was misplaced.

Reggie's Branch was in a big Station, and worked
with the usual staff — one Manager, one Accountant,
both English, a Cashier and a horde of native clerks,
besides the PoKce patrol at nights outside. The bulk
of its work, for it was in a thriving district, was hoondi
and accommodation of all kinds. A fool has no grip
of this sort of business, and a clever man who does
not go about among his clients, and know more than a
little of their affairs, is worse than a fool. 'Reggie was
young-looking, clean-shaved, with a twinkle in his eye,
and a head that nothing short of a gallon of the Gun-
ners' Madeira could make any impression on.

One day, at a big dinner, he announced casually that
the Directors had shifted on to him a National Curiosity
from England, in the Accountant line. He was perfectly
correct. Mr. Silas Riley, Accountant, was a most curi-
ous animal — a long, gawky, rawboned Yorkshire man,
full of the savage self-conceit that blossoms only in the
best county in England. Arrogance was a mild word
for the mental attitude of Mr. S. Riley. He had worked

A BANK FRAUD 187

himself up, after seven years, to a Cashier's position
in a Huddersfield Bank; and all his experience lay
among the factories of the North. Perhaps he would
have done better on the Bombay side, where they are
happy with one-half per cent, profits, and money is cheap.
He was useless for Upper India and a wheat-Province,
where a man wants a large head and a touch of imagina-
tion if he is to turn out a satisfactory balance-sheet.

He was wonderfully narrow-minded in business, and,
being new to the country, had no notion that Indian
banking is totally distinct from Home work. Like
most clever self-made men, he had much simplicity in
his nature; and, somehow or other, had construed the
ordinarily polite terms of his letter of engagement into
a beHef that the Directors had chosen him on account
of his special and brilliant talents, and that they set
great store by him. This notion grew and crystallised;
thus adding to his natural North-country conceit.
Further, he was delicate, suffered from some trouble in
his chest, and was short in his temper.

You will admit that Reggie had reason to call his
new Accountant a Natural Curiosity. The two men
failed to hit it off at all. Riley considered Reggie a
wild, feather-headed idiot, given to Heaven only knew
what dissipation in low places called ^Messes,' and
totally unfit for the serious and solemn vocation of
banking. He could never get over Reggie's look of
youth and 'you-be-damned ' air; and he couldn't under-
stand Reggie's friends — clean-built, careless men in the
Army — who rode over to big Sunday breakfasts at the
Bank, and told sultry stories till Riley got up and left
the room. Riley was always showing Reggie how the

i88 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

business ought to be conducted, and Reggie had more
than once to remind him that seven years' limited experi-
ence between Huddersfield and Beverley did not qualify
a man to steer a big up-country business. Then Riley
sulked, and referred to himself as a pillar of the Bank
and cherished friend of the Directors, and Reggie tore
his hair. If a man's English subordinates fail him in
India, he comes to a hard time indeed, for native help
has strict limitations. In the winter Riley went sick
for weeks at a time with his lung complaint, and this
threw more work on Reggie. But he preferred it to the
everlasting friction when Riley was well.

One of the Travelling Inspectors of the Bank dis-
covered these collapses and reported them to the Direc-
tors. Now Riley had been foisted on the Bank by an
M.P., who wanted the support of Riley's father, who,
again, was anxious to get his son out to a warmer climate
because of those lungs. The M.P. had interest in the
Bank; but one of the Directors wanted to advance a
nominee of his own; and, after Riley's father had died,
he made the rest of the Board see that an Accountant
who was sick for half the year had better give place to a
healthy man. If Riley had known the real story of his
appointment, he might have behaved better; but, know-
ing nothing, his stretches of sickness alternated with
restless, persistent, meddling irritation of Reggie, and all
the hundred ways in which conceit in a subordinate sit-
uation can find play. Reggie used to call him striking
and hair-curling names behind his back as a relief to his
own feelings; but he never abused him to his face, because
he said, ' Riley is such a frail beast that half of his loath-
some conceit is due to pains in the chest.'

A BANK FRAUD 189

Late one April, Riley went very sick indeed. The
Doctor punched and thumped him, and told him he
would be better before long. Then the Doctor went to
Reggie and said — 'Do you know how sick your Ac-
countant is?' — 'No!' said Reggie — 'The worse the
better, confound him! He's a nuisance when he's well.
I'll let you take away the Bank Safe if you can keep him
quiet through this hot weather.'

But the Doctor did not laugh— 'Man, I'm not joking,'
he said. 'I'll give him another three months in his bed
and a week or so more to die in. On my honour and
reputation that's all the grace he has in this world.
Consumption has hold of him to the marrow.'

Reggie's face changed at once into the face of 'Mr.
Reginald Burke,' and he answered, 'What can I do?'
— 'Nothing,' said the Doctor. 'For all practical pur-
poses the man is dead already. Keep him quiet and
cheerful, and tell him he's going to recover. That's
all. I'll look after him to the end, of course.'

The Doctor went away, and Reggie sat down to open
the evening mail. His first letter was one from the
Directors, intimating for his information that Mr.
Riley was to resign, under a month's notice, by the
terms of his agreement, telling Reggie that their letter
to Riley would follow, and advising Reggie of the com-
ing of a new Accountant, a man whom Reggie knew and
liked.

Reggie lit a cheroot, and, before he had finished
smoking, he had sketched the outHne of a fraud. He
put away — burked — the Directors' letter, and went
in to talk to Riley, who was as ungracious as usual,
and fretting himself over the way the Bank would run

IQO PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

during his illness. He never thought of the extra
work on Reggie's shoulders, but solely of the damage
to his own prospects of advancement. Then Reggie
assured him that everything would be well, and that
he, Reggie, would confer with Riley daily on the man-
agement of the Bank. Riley was a Uttle soothed,
but he hinted in as many words that he did not think
much of Reggie's business capacity. Reggie was
humble. And he had letters in his desk from the
Directors that a Gilbarte or a Hardie might have been
proud of!

The days passed in the big darkened house, and the
Directors' letter of dismissal to Riley came and was
put away by Reggie, who, every evening, brought the
books to Riley's room, and showed him what had been
going forward, while Riley snarled. Reggie did his
best to make statements pleasing to Riley, but the
Accountant was sure that the Bank was going to rack
and ruin without him. In June, as the lying in bed
told on his spirit, he asked whether his absence had been
noted by the Directors, and Reggie said that they had
written most sympathetic letters, hoping that he would
be able to resume his valuable services before long.
He showed Riley the letters; and Riley said that the
Directors ought to have written to him direct. A few
days later, Reggie opened Riley's mail in the half-light
of the room, and gave him the sheet — not the envelope
—of a letter to Riley from the Directors. Riley said
he would thank Reggie not to interfere with his private
papers, specially as Reggie knew he was too weak to
open his own letters. Reggie apologised.

Then Riley's mood changed, and he lectured Reggie

A BANK FRAUD 191

on his evil ways: his horses and his bad friends. 'Of
course lying here, on my back, Mr. Burke, I can't keep
you straight; but when I'm well, I do hope you'll pay
some heed to my words.' Reggie, who had dropped
polo, and dinners, and tennis and all, to attend to
Riley, said that he was penitent and settled Riley's
head on the pillow and heard him fret and contradict
in hard, dry, hacking whispers, without a sign of im-
patience. This, at the end of a heavy day's ofl&ce
work, doing double duty, in the latter half of June.

When the new Accountant came, Reggie told him
the facts of the case, and announced to Riley that he
had a guest sta}dng with him. Riley said that he
might have had more consideration than to entertain
his 'doubtful friends' at such a time. Reggie made
Carron, the new Accountant, sleep at the Club in conse-
quence. Carron's arrival took some of the heavy work
off his shoulders, and he had time to attend to Riley's
exactions — to explain, soothe, invent, and settle and
re-settle the poor wretch in bed, and to forge compli-
mentary letters from Calcutta. At the end of the first
month Riley wished to send some money home to his
mother. Reggie sent the draft. At the end of the
second month Riley's salary came in just the same.
Reggie paid it out of his own pocket, and, with it,
wrote Riley a beautiful letter from the Directors.

Riley was very ill indeed, but the flame of his life
burnt unsteadily. Now and then he would be cheer-
ful and confident about the future, sketching plans for
going Home and seeing his mother. Reggie listened
patiently when the office-work was over, and encour-
aged him.

192 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

At other times Riley insisted on Reggie reading the
Bible and griin 'Methody' tracts to him. Out of these
tracts he pointed morals directed at his Manager. But
he always found time to worry Reggie about the work-
ing of the Bank, and to show him where the weak points
lay.

This indoor, sickroom Hfe and constant strains wore
Reggie down a good deal, and shook his nerves, and
lowered his billiard play by forty points. But the
business of the Bank, and the business of the sickroom,
had to go on, though the glass was ii6° in the shade.

At the end of the third month Riley was sinking
fast, and had begun to reaHse that he was very sick.
But the conceit that made him worry Reggie kept him
from beUeving the worst. 'He wants some sort of
mental stimulant if he is to drag on,' said the Doctor.
^Keep him interested in Hfe if you care about his living.'
So Riley, contrary to all the laws of business and the
finance, received a 25-per-cent. rise of salary from the
Directors. The 'mental stimulant' succeeded beau-
tifully. Riley was happy and cheerful, and, as is often
the case in consumption, healthiest in mind when the
body was weakest. He lingered for a full month,
snarling and fretting about the Bank, talking of the
future, hearing the Bible read, lecturing Reggie on sin,
and wondering when he would be able to move abroad.

But at the end of September, one mercilessly hot
evening, he rose up in his bed with a Httle gasp, and
said quickly to Reggie — 'Mr. Burke, I am going to die.
I know it in myself. My chest is all hollow inside, and
there's nothing to breathe with. To the best of my
knowledge I have done nowt' — he was returning to the

A BANK FRAUD 193

talk of his boyhood — 'to lie heavy on my conscience.
God be thanked, I have been preserved from the grosser
forms of sin; and I counsel you, Mr. Burke . . .'

Here his voice died down, and Reggie stooped over him.

' Send my salary for September to my Mother . . .
done great things with the Bank if I had been spared
. . . mistaken policy . . . no f ault of mine^ . . .

Then he turned his face to the wall and die.

Reggie drew the sheet over Its face, and went out into
the verandah, with his last 'mental stimulant' — a letter
of condolence and sympathy from the Directors — unused
in his pocket.

'If I'd been only ten minutes earlier,' thought Reggie,
* I might have heartened him up to pull through another
day.'

TODS' AMENDMENT

The World hath set its heavy yoke
Upon the old white-bearded folk

Who strive to please the King.
God's mercy is upon the young,
God's wisdom in the baby tongue

That fears not anything.

— Tlie Parable of Chajju Bhagat.

Now Tods' Mamma was a singularly charming woman,
and every one in Simla knew Tods. Most men had saved
him from death on occasions. He was beyond his ayah's
control altogether, and perilled his life daily to find out
what would happen if you pulled a Mountain Battery
mule's tail. He was an utterly fearless young Pagan,
about six years old, and the only baby who ever broke the
holy calm of the Supreme Legislative Council.

Thus it happened: Tods' pet kid got loose, and fled up
the hill, off the Boileaugunge Road, Tods after it, until it
burst into the Viceregal Lodge lawn, then attached to
'Peterhoff.' The Council were sitting at the time, and
the windows were open because it was warm. The Red
Lancer in the porch told Tods to go away; but Tods knew
the Red Lancer and most of the Members of the Council
personally. Moreover, he had firm hold of the kid's
collar, and was being dragged all across the flower-beds.
* Give my salaam to the long Councillor Sahib, and ask
him to help me take Moti back!' gasped Tods. The

194

TODS' AMENDMENT igs

Council heard the noise through the open windows; and,
after an interval, was seen the shocking spectacle of a
Legal Member and a Lieutenant-Governor helping, under
the direct patronage of a Commander-in-Chief and a
Viceroy, one small and very dirty boy in a sailor's suit
and a tangle of brown hair, to coerce a lively and
rebelHous kid. They headed it off down the path to
the Mall, and Tods went home in triumph and told his
Mamma that all the Councillor Sahibs had been helping
him to catch Moti. Whereat his Mamma smacked Tods
for interfering with the administration of the Empire; but
Tods met the Legal Member the next day, and told him in
confidence that if the Legal Member ever wanted to
catch a goat, he. Tods, would give him all the help in his
power. ' Thank you, Tods,' said the Legal Member.

Tods was the idol of some eighty jhampanis, and half as
msiny saises. He saluted them all as '0 Brother.' It never
entered his head that any living human being could dis-
obey his orders; and he was the buffer between the
servants and his Mamma's wrath. The working of that
household turned on Tods, who was adored by every one
from the dhoby to the dog-boy. Even Futteh Khan, the
villainous loafer khit from Mussoorie, shirked risking Tods'
displeasure for fear his co-mates should look down on him.

So Tods had honour in the land from Boileaugunge to
Chota Simla, and ruled justly according to his lights. Of
course, he spoke Urdu, but he had also mastered many
queer-side speeches like the chotee bolee of the women, and
held grave converse with shopkeepers and Hill-coolies
alike. He was precocious for his age, and his mixing with
natives had taught him some of the more bitter truths of
life : the meanness and the sordidness of it. He used; over

196 ' PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

his bread and milk, to deliver solemn and serious aphor-
isms, translated from the vernacular into the English,
that made his Mamma jump and vow that Tods must go
Home next hot weather.

Just when Tods was in the bloom of his power, the
Supreme Legislature were hacking out a Bill for the Sub-
Montane Tracts, a revision of the then Act, smaller than
the Punjab Land Bill but affecting a few hundred
thousand people none the less. The Legal Member had
built, and bolstered, and embroidered, and amended that
Bill, till it looked beautiful on paper. Then the Council
began to settle what they called the ' minor details.' As if
any EngUshman legislating for natives knows enough to
know which are the minor and w^hich are the major
points, from the native point of view, of any measure!
That Bill was a triumph of ' safe-guarding the interests of
the tenant.' One clause provided that land should not be
leased on longer terms than five years at a stretch ; because,
if the landlord had a tenant bound down for, say, twenty
years, he would squeeze the very Hfe out of him. The
notion was to keep up a stream of independent cultivators
in the Sub-Montane Tracts; and ethnologically and
poHtically the notion was correct. The only drawback
was that it was altogether wrong. A native's Hfe in
India implies the life of his son. Wherefore, you cannot
legislate for one generation at a time. You must con-
sider the next from the native point of view. Curiously
enough, the native now and then, and in Northern India
more particularly, hates being over-protected against
himself. There was a Naga village once, where they
lived on dead and buried Commissariat mules. . . .
But that is another story.

TODS' AMENDMENT 197

For many reasons, to be explained later, the people
/-oncerned objected to the Bill. The Native Member in
Council knew as much about Punjabis as he knew about
Charing Cross. He had said in Calcutta that 'the Bill
was entirely in accord with the desires of that large and
important class, the cultivators'; and so on, and so on.
The Legal Member's knowledge of natives was limited to
EngHsh-speaking Durbaris, and his own red chaprassis,
the Sub-Montane Tracts concerned no one in particular,
the Deputy Commissioners were a good deal too driven to
make representations, and the measure was one which
dealt with small landholders only. Nevertheless, the
Legal Member prayed that it might be correct, for he was
a nervously conscientious man. He did not know that no
man can tell what natives think unless he mixes with
them with the varnish off. And not always then. But
he did the best he knew. And the measure came up to
the Supreme Council for the final touches, while Tods
patrolled the Burra Simla Bazar in his morning rides, and
played with the monkey belonging to Ditta Mull, the
bunnia, and listened, as a child Hstens, to all the stray
talk about this new freak of the Lord Sahib's.

One day there was a dinner-party, at the house of Tods'
Mamma, and the Legal Member came. Tods was in bed,
but he kept awake till he heard the bursts of laughter
from the men over the coffee. Then he paddled out in
his little red flannel dressing-gown and his night-suit and
took refuge by the side of his father, knowing that he
would not be sent back. 'See the miseries of having a
family ! ' said Tods' father, giving Tods three prunes, some
water in a glass that had been used for claret, and telUng
him to sit still. Tods sucked the prunes slowly, knowing

198 PLAIN TALES FROM THE fflLLS

that he would have to go when they were finished, and
sipped the pink water Hke a man of the world, as he
listened to the conversation. Presently, the Legal
Member, talking 'shop' to the Head of a Department,
mentioned his Bill by its full name — 'The Sub-Montane
Tracts Ryotwary Revised Enactment/ Tods caught the
one native word and lifting up his small voice said —

'Oh, I know all about that! Has it been murramutted
yet. Councillor Sahib? '

'How much? ' said the Legal Member.

^Murramutted — mended. — Put theek, you know — ^made
nice to please Ditta Mull ! '

The Legal Member left his place and moved up next to
Tods.

'What do you know about rvotwari. Httle man?' he
said.

' I'm not a little man, I'm Tods, and I know all about it.
Ditta Mull, and Choga Lall, and Amir Nath, and — oh,
lakhs of my friends tell me about it in the bazars when I
talk to them.'

' Oh, they do— do they? What do they say. Tods? '

Tods tucked his feet under his red flannel dressing-
gown and said — ' I -mxistfink.'

The Legal Member waited patiently. Then Tods with
infinite compassion —

'You don't speak my talk, do you. Councillor Sahib? ^

'No; I am sorry to say I do not,' said the Legal
Member.

' Very well,' said Tods, ' I must^w^ in EngUsh.'

He spent a minute putting his ideas in order, and began
very slowly, translating in his mind from the vernacular
to EngUsh, as many Anglo-Indian children do. You must

TODS' AMENDMENT 199

remember that the Legal Member helped him on by
questions when he halted, for Tods was not equal to the
sustained flight of oratory that follows.

'Ditta Mull says, ''This thing is the talk of a child, and
was made up by fools.'' But / don't think you are a fool,
Councillor Sahib' said Tods, hastily. 'You caught my
goat. This is what Ditta Mull says— "I am not a fool,
and why should the Sirkar say I am a child? I can see if
the land is good and if the landlord is good. If I am a
fool the sin is upon my own head. For five years I take
my ground for which I have saved money, and a wife I
take too, and a Httle son is born." Ditta Mull has one
daughter now, but he says he will have a son, soon. And
he says, "At the end of five years, by'this new butidobusty I
must go. If I do not go, I must get fresh seals and takkus-
stamps on the papers, perhaps in the middle of the
harvest, and to go to the law-courts once is wisdom, but
to go twice is Jehannum.^' That is quite true,' explained
Tods, gravely. ' All my friends say so. And Ditta
Mull says, "Always fresh takkus and pa>dng money
to vakils and chaprassis and law-courts every five years, or
else the landlord makes me go. Why do I want to go?
Am I a fool? If I am a fool and do not know, after forty
years, good land when I see it, let me die ! But if the new
bundobust says for fifteen years, that it is good and wise.
My little son is a man, and I am burnt, and he takes the
ground or another ground, paying only once for the
takkus-?>t2im^s on the papers, and his little son is born and
at the end of fifteen years is a man too. But what profit is
there in five years and fresh papers ! Nothing but dikh
trouble, dikh. We are not young men who take these
lands, but old ones— not farmers^ but tradesmen with a

300 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

little money — and for fifteen years we shall have peace.
Nor are we children that the Sirkar should treat us so."'

Here Tods stopped short, for the whole table were lis-
tening. The Legal Member said to Tods, ' Is that all? '

'All I can remember,' said Tods. 'But you should see
Ditta Mull's big monkey. It's just like a Coimdllor
SahibJ

' Tods ! Go to bed,' said his father.

Tods gathered up his dressing-gown tail and departed.

The Legal Member brought his hand down on the
table with a crash— 'By Jove!' said the Legal Member,
'I believe the boy is right. The short tenure is the
weak point.'

He left early, thinking over what Tods had said.
Now, it was obviously impossible for the Legal Member
to play with a hunnia's monkey, by way of getting
understanding; but he did better. He made inquiries,
always bearing in mind the fact that the real native —
not the hybrid. University-trained mule — is as timid as
a colt, and, little by little, he coaxed some of the men
whom the measure concerned most intimately to give
in their views, which squared very closely with Tods'
evidence.

So the BiU was amended in that clause; and the
Legal Member was filled with an uneasy suspicion that
Native Members represent very little except the Orders
they carry on their bosoms. But he put the thought
from him as illiberal. He was a most Liberal man.

After a time, the news spread through the bazars that
Tods had got the Bill recast in the tenure-clause, and
if Tods' Mamma had not interfered, Tods would have
made himself sick on the baskets of fruit and pistachio

TODS' AMENDMENT 20t

nuts and Cabuli grapes and almonds that crowded the
verandah. Till he went Home, Tods ranked some few
degrees before the Viceroy in popular estimation. But
for the little Hfe of him Tods could not understand why.
In the Legal Member's private-paper-box still lies
the rough draft of the Sub-Montane Tracts Ryotwary
Revised Enactment; and, opposite the twenty-second
clause pencilled in blue chalk, and signed by the Legal
Member, are the words ^ Tods' Amendment J

THE DAUGHTER OF THE REGIMENT

Jain 'Ardin' was a Sargint's wife,
A Sargint's wife wus she.
« She married of 'un in Orldershort

An' corned acrost the sea.
(Chorus) 'Ave you never 'eard tell o' Jain 'Ardin'?

Jain 'Ardin'?
Jain 'Ardin'?
'Ave j'^ou never 'eard tell o' Jain 'Ardin'?
The pride o' the Companeef

— Old Barrack-Room Ballad.

'A GENTLEMAN who doesn't know the Circasian Circle
ought not to stand up for it — puttin* everybody out.'
That was what Miss McKenna said, and the Sergeant
who was my vis-d-vis looked the same thing. I was
afraid of Miss McKenna. She was six feet high, all
yellow freckles and red hair, and was simply clad in
white satin shoes, a pink muslin dress, an apple-green
stuff sash, and black silk gloves, with yellow roses in
her hair. Wherefore I fled from Miss McKenna and
sought my friend Private Mulvaney, who was at the
cant — refreshment- table.

*So you've been dancin' with little Jhansi McKenna,
Sorr — she that's goin' to marry Corp'ril Slane? Whin
you next conversh wid your lorruds an' your ladies,
tell thim you've danced wid little Jhansi. 'Tis a thing
to be proud av.'

ao2

THE DAUGHTER OF THE REGIMENT aoj

But I wasn't proud. I was humble. I saw a story
in Private Mulvaney's eye; and besides, if he stayed
too long at the bar, he would, I knew, qualify for more
pack-drill. Now to meet an esteemed friend doing
pack-drill outside the guard-room is embarrassing,
especially if you happen to be walking with his Com-
manding Officer.

'Come on to the parade-ground, Mulvaney, it's
cooler there, and tell me about Miss McKenna. What
is she, and who is she, and why is she called '' Jhansi"?'

'D'ye mane to say you've niver heard av Ould Pum-
meloe's daughter? An' you thinkin' you know things!
I'm wid ye in a minut' whin me poipe's ht.'

We came out under the stars. Mulvaney sat down
on one of the artillery bridges, and began in the usual
way: his pipe between his teeth, his big hands clasped
and dropped between his knees, and his cap well on the
back of his head —

'Whin Mrs. Mulvaney, that is, was Miss Shad, that
was, you were a dale younger than you are now, an'
the Army was dif'rint in sev'ril e-senshuls. Bhoys
have no call for to marry nowadays, an' that's why
the Army has so few rale, good, honust, swearin', strap-
agin', tinder-hearted, heavy-futted wives as ut used to
have whin I was a Corp'ril. I was rejuced afther-
wards — but no matther — I was a Corp'ril wanst. In
thim times, a man Hved an' died wid his rigiment;
an' by natur', he married whin he was a man. Whin
I was Corp'ril — Mother av Hivin, how the rigimint
has died an' been borrun since that day! — my Colour-
Sar'jint was Ould McKenna, an' a married man tu.
An' his woife — his first woife, for he married three

304 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

times did McKenna — was Bridget McKenna, from Port-
arlington, like mesilf. I've misremembered fwhat her
first name was, but in B Comp'ny we called her *'Ould
Pummeloe," by reason av her figure, which was entirely
cir-cum-fe-renshill. Like the big dhrum! Now that
woman — God rock her sowl to rest in glory! — was for
everlastin' havin' childher ; an' McKenna, whin the fifth or
sixth come squallin' on to the musther-roll, swore he
wud number thim off in future. But Ould Pummeloe she
prayed av him to christen them after the names av the
stations they was borrun in. So there was Colaba
McKenna, an' Muttra McKenna, an' a whole Presi-
dincy av other McKennas, an' little Jhansi, dancin' over
yonder. Whin the childher wasn't bornin', they was
dyin'; for, av our childher die like sheep in these days,
they died like flies thin. I lost me own Httle Shad — but
no matther. 'Tis long ago, and Mrs. Mulvaney niver
had another.

^I'm digresshin. Wan divil's hot srnnmer, there
come an order from some mad ijjit, whose name I mis-
remember, for the rigimint to go up-country. Maybe
they wanted to know how the new rail carried throops.
They knew! On me sowl, they knew before they was
done ! Old Pummeloe had just buried Muttra McKenna ;
an', the season bein' onwholesim, only little Jhansi
McKenna, who was four year ould thin, was left on
hand.

'Five childher gone in fourteen months. 'Twas
harrd, wasn't ut?

' So we wint up to our new station in that blazin' heat
— may the curse av Saint Lawrence conshume the man
who gave the ordher! Will I iver forget that move?

THE DAUGHTER OF THE REGIMENT 205

Tliey gave us two wake thrains to the rigimint; an'
we was eight hundher' and sivinty strong. There was
A, B, C, an' D Companies in the secon' thrain, wid
twelve women, no orficers' ladies, an' thirteen childher.
We was to go six hundher' miles, an' railways was new
in thim days. Whin we had been a night in the belly
av the thrain— the men ragin' in their shirts an' dhrink-
in' anything they cud find, an' eatin' bad fruit-stuff
whin they cud, for we cudn't stop 'em — I was a Corp'ril
thin— the cholera bruk out wid the dawnin' av the
day.

*Pray to the Saints, you may niver see cholera in
a throop- thrain! 'Tis like the judgmint av God hittin'
down from the nakid sky! We run into a rest-camp
— as ut might have been Ludianny, but not by any
means so comfortable. The Orficer Commandin' sent
a telegrapt up the line, three hundher' mile up, askin'
for help. Faith, we wanted ut, for ivry sowl av the
followers ran for the dear life as soon as the thrain
stopped; an' by the time that telegrapt was writ, there
wasn't a naygur in the station exceptin' the telegrapt-
clerk — an' he only bekaze he was held down to his
chair by the scruff av his sneakin' black neck. Thin
the day began wid the noise in the carr'ges, an' the
rattle av the men on the platform fallin' over, arms
an' all, as they stud for to answer the Comp'ny muster-
roll before goin' over to the camp. 'Tisn't for me to
say what like the cholera was like. Maybe the Doctor
cud ha' tould, av he hadn't dropped on to the platform
from the door av a carriage where we was takin' out the
dead. He died wid the rest. Some bhoys had died in
the night. We tuk out siven, and twenty more was

2o6 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

sickenin' as we tuk thim. The women was huddled up
anyways, screamin' wid fear.

'Sez the Commandin' Orficer whose name I misre-
member, ^'Take the women over to that tope av trees
yonder. Get thim out av the camp. 'Tis no place
for thim."

'Ould Pummeloe was sittin' on her beddin'-rowl,
thryin' to kape Httle Jhansi quiet. ''Go off to that
tope!" sez the Orficer. ''Go out av the men's way!"

'"Be damned av I do!" sez Quid Pummeloe, an'
little Jhansi, squattin' by her mother's side, squeaks
out, "Be damned av I do," tu. Thin Quid Pummeloe
turns to the women an' she sez, "Are ye goin' to let the
bhoys die while you're picnickin', ye sluts?" sez she.
" 'Tis wather they want. Come on an' help."

'Wid that, she turns up her sleeves an' steps out
for a well behind the rest-camp — Uttle Jhansi trottin*
behind v/id a lotah an' string, an' the other women
followin' Hke lambs, wid horse-buckets and cookin'
pots. Whin all the things was full, Quid Pummeloe
marches back into camp — 'twas like a battlefield wid
all the glory missin' — at the hid av the rigimint av
women.

'"McKenna, me man!" she sez, wid a voice on her
like grand-roun's challenge, "tell the bhoys to be quiet.
Ould Pummeloe's comin' to look afther thim — wid
free dhrinks."

'Thin we cheered, an' the cheerin' in the lines was
louder than the noise av the poor divils wid the sick-
ness on thim. But not much.

'You see, we was a new an' raw rigimint in those
days, an' we cud make neither head nor tail av th^

THE DAUGHTER OF THE REGIMENT 207

sickness; an' so we was useless. The men was goin'
roun' an' about like dumb sheep, waitin' for the nex'
man to fall over, an' sayin' undher their spache, "Fwhat
is ut? In the name av God, Jwhat is ut?" 'Twas
horrible. But through ut all, up an' down, an' down
an' up, wint Ould Pummeloe an' little Jhansi — all we
cud see av the baby, undher a dead man's helmut
wid the chin-strap swingin' about her little stummick
— up an' down wid the wather an' fwhat brandy there
was.

'Now an' thin Ould Pummeloe, the tears runnin'
down her fat, red face, sez, "Me bhoys, me poor, dead,
darlin' bhoys!" But, for the most, she was thryin' to
put heart into the men an' kape thim stiddy; and little
Jhansi was tellin' thim all they wud be "betther in the
mornin'." 'Twas a thrick she'd picked up from hearin'
Ould Pummeloe whin Muttra was burnin' out wid fever.
In the mornin'! 'Twas the iverlastin' mornin' at
St. Pether's Gate was the mornin' for siven-an '-twenty
good men; and twenty more was sick to the death in
that bitter, burnin' sun. But the women worked like
angils as I've said, an' the men like divils, till two doctors
come down from above, and we was rescued.

'But, just before that, Ould Pummeloe, on her knees
over a bhoy in my squad^right-cot man to me he was in
the barrick — tellin' him the worrud av the Church that
niver failed a man yet, sez, ''Hould me up, bhoys!
I'm feeHn' bloody sick! " 'Twas the sun, not the cholera,
did ut. She misremembered she was only wearin' her
ould black bonnet, an' she died wid ''McKenna, me
man," houldin' her up, an' the bhoys howled whin
they buried her.

2o8 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

'That night, a big wind blew, an' blew, an* blew,
an' blew the tents flat. But it blew the cholera away
an' niver another case there was all the while we was
waitin' — ten days in quarantin'. Av you will belave
me, the thrack av the sickness in the camp was for all
the wurruld the thrack av a man walkin' four times in
a figur-av-eight through the tents. They say 'tis the
Wandherin' Jew takes the cholera wid him. I believe
ut.

'An' that' said Mulvaney, illogically, 'is the cause
why little Jhansi McKenna is fwhat she is. She was
brought up by the Quartermaster Sergeant's wife
whin McKenna died, but she b'longs to B Comp'ny;
and this tale I'm tellin' you — wid a propei appreciashin
av Jhansi McKenna — I've belted into ivry recruity av
the Comp'ny as he was drafted. 'Faith, 'twas me
belted Corp'ril Slane into askin' the girl I'

'Not reaUy?'

'Man, I did! She's no beauty to look at, but she's
Ould Pummeloe's daughter, an' 'tis my juty to pro-
vide for her. Just before Slane got his promotion
I sez to him, "Slane," sez I, "to-morrow 'twill be in-
subordinashin av me to chastise you; but, by the sowl
av Ould Pimimeloe, who is now in glory, av you don't
give me your wurrud to ask Jhansi McKenna at wanst,
I'll peel the flesh off yer bones wid a brass huk to-night.
'Tis a dishgrace to B Comp'ny she's been single so long! ''
sez I. Was I goin' to let a three-year-ould preshume to
discoorse wid me — my will bein' set? No! Slane
wint an' asked her. He's a good bhoy is Slane. Wan
av these days he'll get into the Com'ssariat an' dhrive
a buggy wid his — savin's. So I provided for Ould

THE DAUGHTER OF THE REGIMENT 209

Pummeloe's daughter; an' now you go along an' dance
agin wid her/

And I did.

I felt a respect for Miss Jhansi McKenna; and I went to
her wedding later on.

Perhaps I ynll tell you about that one of these days.

IN THE PRIDE OF HIS YOUTH

* Stopped in the straight when the race was his own I

Look at him cutting it — cur to the bone!'

*Ask, ere the youngster be rated and chidden,

What did he carry and how M'as he ridden?

Maybe they used him too much at the start;

Maybe Fate's weight-cloths are breaking his heart.'

— Life's Handicap.

When I was telling you of the joke that The Worm
played off on the Senior Subaltern, I promised a some-
what similar tale, but with all the jest left out. This is
that tale.

Dicky Hatt was kidnapped in his early, early youth —
neither by landlady's daughter, housemaid, barmaid, nor
cook, but by a girl so nearly of his own caste that only a
woman could have said she was just the least little bit in
the world below it. This happened a month before he
came out to India, and five days after his one-and-
twentieth birthday. The girl was nineteen — six years
older than Dicky in the things of this world, that is to say
— and, for the time, twice as fooHsh as he.

Excepting, always, falling off a horse there is nothing
more fatally easy than marriage before the Registrar.
The ceremony costs less than fifty shillings, and is re-
markably like walking into a pawn-shop. After the
declarations of residence have been put in, four minutes
will cover the rest of the proceedings — fees, attestation

EST THE PRIDE OF HIS YOUTH 211

and all. Then the Registrar slides the blotting-pad over
the names, and says grimly with his pen between his
teeth, 'Now you're man and wife'; and the couple walk
out into the street feeUng as if something were horribly
illegal somewhere.

But that ceremony holds and can drag a man to his un-
doing just as thoroughly as the ' long as ye both shall Hve '
curse from the altar-rails, with the bridesmaids giggling
behind, and 'The Voice that breathed o'er Eden' Hfting
the roof off. In this manner was Dicky Hatt kidnapped,
and he considered it vastly fine, for he had received an ap-
pointment in India which carried a magnificent salary from
the Home point of view. The marriage was to be kept
secret for a year. Then Mrs. Dicky Hatt was to come
out, and the rest of Hfe was to be a glorious golden mist.
That was how they sketched it under the Addison Road
Station lamps; and, after one short month, came Graves-
end and Dicky steaming out to his new life, and the girl
crying in a thirty-shillings a week bed-and-living-room, in
a back-street off MontpeUer Square near the Knights-
bridge Barracks.

But the country that Dicky came to was a hard land
where men of twenty-one were reckoned very small boys
indeed, and life was expensive. The salary that loomed
so large six thousand miles away did not go far. Particu-
larly when Dicky divided it by two, and remitted more
than a fair half, at i-6|, to Montpelier Square. One
hundred and thirty-five rupees out of three hundred and
thirty is not much to Hve on; but it was absurd to suppose
that Mrs. Hatt could exist for ever on the £20 held back
by Dicky from his outfit allowance. Dicky saw this and
remitted at once; always remembering that Rs. 700 were

>.i2 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

!;o be paid, twelve months later, for a first-class passage
out for a lady. When you add to these trifling details the
natural instincts of a boy beginning a new life in a new
country and longing to go about and enjoy himself, and
the necessity for grappling with strange work — which,
properly speaking, should take up a boy's undivided
attention — you will see that Dicky started handicapped.
He saw it himself for a breath or two; but he did not guess
the full beauty of his future.

As the hot weather began, the shackles settled on him
and ate into his flesh. First would come letters — big,
crossed, seven-sheet letters — from his wife, telling him
how she longed to see him, and what a Heaven upon earth
would be their property when they met. Then some boy
of the chummery wherein Dicky lodged would pound on
the door of his bare Httle room, and tell him to come out
to look at a pony — the very thing to suit him. Dicky
could not afford ponies. He had to explain this. Dicky
could not afford Hving in the chummery, modest as it
was. He had to explain this before he moved to a single
room next the office where he worked aU day. He kept
house on a green oilcloth table-cover, one chair, one bed-
stead, one photograph, one tooth-glass very strong and
thick, a seven-rupee eight-anna filter, and messing by
contract at thirty-seven rupees a month. Which last
item was extortion. He had no punkah, for a pimkah
costs fifteen rupees a month; but he slept on the roof of
the office with all his wife's letters under his pillow. Now
and again he was asked out to dinner, where he got both a
pimkah and an iced drink. But this was seldom, for
people objected to recognising a boy who had evidently
the instincts of a Scotch tallow-chandler, and who lived in

IN TPIE PRIDE OF HIS YOUTH 213

such a nasty fashion. Dicky could not subscribe to any
amusement, so he found no amusement except the pleas-
ure of turning over his Bank-book and reading what it
said about 'loans on approved security/ That cost
nothing. He remitted through a Bombay Bank, by
the way, and the Station knew^ nothing of his private
affairs.

Each month he sent Home all that he could possibly
spare for his wife and for another Reason which was ex-
pected to explain itself shortly, and would require more
money.

About this time Dicky was overtaken with the nervous,
haunting fear that besets married men when they are out
of sorts. He had no pension to look to. What if he
should die suddenly, and leave his wife unprovided for?
The thought would lay hold of him in the still, hot nights
on the roof, till the shaking of his heart made him think
that he was going to die then and there of heart-disease.
Now this is a frame of mind which no boy has a right to
know. It is a strong man's trouble; but, coming when it
did, it nearly drove poor punkah-less, perspiring Dicky
Hatt mad. He could tell no one about it.

A certain amount of ' screw ' is as necessary for a man as
for a billiard-ball. It makes them both do wonderful
things. Dicky needed money badly, and he worked for it
like a horse. But, naturally, the men who owed him
knew that a boy can live very comfortably on a certain in-
come— pay in India is a matter of age not merit, you see,
and, if their particular boy wished to work like two boys,
Business forbid that they should stop him. But Business
forbid that they should give him an increase of pay at his
present ridiculously immature age! So Dicky won

t£4 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

certain rises of salary — ample for a boy — not enough for
a wife and a child — certainly too Httle for the seven-
hundred-rupee passage that he and Mrs. Hatt had dis-
cussed so lightly once upon a time. And with this he was
forced to be content.

Somehow, all his money seemed to fade away in Home
drafts and the crushing Exchange, and the tone of the
Home letters changed and grew querulous. 'Why
wouldn't Dicky have his wife and the baby out? Surely
he had a salary — a fine salary — and it was too bad of him
to enjoy himself in India. But would he — could he —
make the next draft a little more elastic? ' Here followed
a list of baby's kit, as long as a Parsee's bill. Then Dicky,
whose heart yearned to his wife and the little son he had
never seen, — which, again, is a feeling no boy is entitled
to, — enlarged the draft and wrote queer half-boy, half-
man letters, saying that life was not so enjoyable after all
and would the little wife wait yet a little longer? But the
Httle wife, however much she approved of money, objected
to waiting, and there was a strange, hard sort of ring in
her letters that Dicky didn't understand. How could he,
poor boy?

Later on still — just as Dicky had been told — apropos
of another youngster who had 'made a fool of himseK' as
the saying is — that matrimony would not only ruin his
further chances of advancement, but would lose him his
present appointment — came the news that the baby, his
own little, little son, had died and, behind this, forty lines
of an angry woman's scrawl, saying the death might have
been averted if certain things, all costing money, had been
done, or if the mother and the baby had been with Dicky.
The letter struck at Dicky's naked heart; but, not being

I

IN THE PRIDE OF HIS YOUTH 215

officially entitled to a baby, he could show no sign of
trouble.

How Dicky won through the next four months, and
what hope he kept alight to force him into his work, no
one dare say. He pounded on, the seven-hundred-rupee
passage as far away as ever, and his style of living un-
changed, except when he launched into a new filter.
There was the strain of his office-work, and the strain of
his remittances, and the knowledge of his boy's death,
which touched the boy more, perhaps, than it would have
touched a man; and, beyond all, the enduring strain of his
daily Hfe. Gray-headed seniors who approved of his
thrift and his fashion of denying himself everything
pleasant, reminded him of the old saw that says —

If a youth would be distinguished in his art, art, art,
He must keep the girls away from his heart, heart, heart.

And Dicky, who fancied he had been through every
trouble that a man is permitted to know, had to laugh and
agree; with the last line of his balanced Bank-book
jingHng in his head day and night.

But he had one more sorrow to digest before the end.
There arrived a letter from the little wife — the natural
sequence of the others if Dicky had only known it — and
the burden of that letter was * gone with a handsomer man
than you.' It was a rather curious production, without
stops, scnething like this — * She was not going to wait for
ever and the baby was dead and Dicky was only a boy
and he would never set eyes on her again and why hadn't
he waved his handkerchief to her when he left Gravesend
and God was her judge she was a wicked woman but Dicky

2i6 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

was worse enjoying himself in India and this other man
loved the ground she trod on and would Dicky ever for-
give her for she would never forgive Dicky; and there
was no address to write to.'

Instead of thanking his stars that he was free, Dicky
discovered exactly how an injured husband feels — again,
not at all the knowledge to ^:^hich a boy is entitled — for
his mind went back to his wife as he remembered her in
the thirty-shilling ' suite ' in Monlpelier Square, when the
dawn of his last morning in England was breaking, and
she was crying in the bed. Whereat he rolled about on
his bed and bit his fingers. He never stopped to think
whether, if he had met Mrs. Hatt after those two years,
he vv^ould have discovered that he and she had grown
quite different and new persons. This, theoretically, he
ought to have done. He spent the night after the
English Mail came in rather severe pain.

Next morning, Dicky Hatt felt disinclined to work. He
argued that he had missed the pleasure of youth. He
was tired, and he had tasted all the sorrow in life before
three-and-twenty. His Honour was gone — that was the
man; and now he, too, would go to the Devil — that was
the boy in him. So he put his head down on the green
oil-cloth table-cover, and wept before resigning his post
and all it offered.

But the reward of his services came. He was given
three days to reconsider himself, and the Head f the
establishment, after some telegraphings, said that it
was a most unusual step, but, in view of the abiHty that
Mr. Hatt had displayed at such and such a time, at oUch
and such junctures, he was in a position to offer him an
infinitely superior post — first on probation and later, in

IN THE PRIDE OF HIS YOUTH 217

the natural course of things, on confirmation. *And
how much does the post carry? ' said Dicky. * Six hun-
dred and fifty rupees/ said the Head slowly, expecting to
see the young man sink with gratitude and joy.

And it came then ! The seven-hundred-rupee passage,
and enough to have saved the wife, and the little son,
and to have allowed of assured and open marriage,
came then. Dicky burst into a roar of laughter —
laughter he could not check — nasty, jangling merriment
that seemed as if it would go on for ever. When he had
recovered himself he said, quite seriously, *I'm tired of
work. I'm an old man now. It's about time I retired.
And I will.'

*The boy's mad!' said the Head.

I think he was right; but Dicky Hatt never reap-
peared to settle the question.

PIG

Go, stalk the red deer o*er the heather,

Ride, follow the fox if you can!
But, for pleasure and profit together,

Allow me the hunting of Man, —
The chase of the Human, the search for the Soul

To its ruin, — the hunting of Man.

— The Old Shikarri.

The difference began in the matter of a horse, with
a twist in his temper, whom Pinecoffin sold to Nafferton
and by whom Nafferton was nearly slain. There may
have been other causes of offence, but the horse was the
official stalldng-horse. Nafferton was very angry; but
Pinecofhn laughed, and said that he had never guar-
anteed the beast's manners. Nafferton laughed too,
though he vowed that he would write off his fall against
Pinecofhn if he waited five years. Now, a Dalesman
from beyond Skip ton will forgive an injury when the
Strid lets a man Hve; but a South Devon man is as soft
as a Dartmoor bog. You can see from their names that
Nafferton had the race-advantage of Pinecoffin. He
was a peculiar man, and his notions of humour were
cruel. He taught me a new and fascinating form of
shikar. He hounded Pinecoffin from Mithankot to Jag-
adri, and from Gurgaon to Abbottabad — up and across
the Punjab, a large Province, and in places remarkably
dry. He said that he had no intention of allowing As-

218

JPIG 219

sistant Commissioners to 'sell him pups,' in the shape
of ramping, screaming countrybreds, without making
their lives a burden to them.

Most Assistant Commissioners develop a bent for
some special work after their first hot weather in the
country. The boys with digestions hope to write their
names large on the Frontier, and struggle for dreary
places like Bannu and Kohat. The biHous ones climb
into the Secretariat. Which is very bad for the Kver.
Others are bitten with a mania for District work, Ghuz-
nivide coins or Persian poetry; while some, who come of
farmers' stock, find that the smell of the Earth after the
Rains gets into their blood, and calls them to 'develop
the resources of the Province.' These men are en-
thusiasts. Pinecofiin belonged to their class. He knew
a great many facts bearing on the cost of bullocks and
temporary wells, and opium-scrapers, and what hap-
pens if you burn too much rubbish on a field in the hope
of enriching used-up soil. All the Pinecofiins come of a
landholding breed, and so the land only took back her
own again. Unfortunately — most unfortunately for
Pinecoffin — he was a CiviHan, as well as a farmer.
Nafferton watched him, and thought about the horse.
Nafferton said, ' See me chase that boy till he drops ! ' I
said, 'You can't get your knife into an Assistant Com-
missioner.' Nafferton told me that I did not under-
stand the administration of the Province.

Our Government is rather peculiar. It gushes on
the agricultural and general information side, and will
supply a moderately resj>ectable man with all sorts of
'economic statistics,' if he speaks to it prettily. For
instance, you are interested in gold-washing in the

220 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

sands of the Sutlej. You pull the string, and find that
it wakes up half a dozen Departments, and finally
communicates, say, with a friend of yours in the Tele-
graph, who once wrote some notes on the customs of
the gold-washers when he was on construction-work
in their part of the Empire. He may or may not be
pleased at being ordered to write out everything he
knows for your benefit. This depends on his tempera-
ment. The bigger man you are, the more information
and the greater trouble can you raise.

Nafferton was not a big man; but he had the repu-
tation of being very ^earnest.' An 'earnest' man can
do much with a Government. There was an earnest
man once who nearly wrecked . . . but all India
knows that story. I am not sure what real * earnest-
ness' is. A very fair imitation can be manufactured
by neglecting to dress decently, by mooning about in
a dreary, misty sort of a way, by taking ofiice-work
home, after staying in office till seven, and by receiv-
ing crowds of native gentlemen on Sundays. That is
one sort of 'earnestness.'

Nafferton cast about for a peg whereon to hang his.
earnestness, and for a string that would conmiunicate
with Pinecoffin. He found both. They were Pig.
Nafferton became an earnest inquirer after Pig. He in-
formed the Government that he had a scheme whereby
a very large percentage of the British Army in India
could be fed, at a very large savings, on Pig. Then he
hinted that Pinecoffin might supply him with the
'varied information necessary to the proper inception
of the scheme.' So the Government wrote on the back
of the letter, 'Instruct Mr. Pinecoffin to furnish Mr.

PIG 221

Nafferton with any information in his power. Govern-
ment is very prone to writing things on the backs of
letters which, later, lead to sore trouble.

Nafferton had not the faintest interest in Pig, but
he knew that Pinecoffin would flounce into the trap.
Pinecoffin was delighted at being consulted about Pig,
The Indian Pig is not exactly an important factor in
agricultural life; but Nafferton explained to Pinecoffin
that there was room for improvement, and corresponded
directly with that young man.

You may think that there is not much to be evolved
from Pig. It all depends how you set to work. Pine-
coffin being a Civilian and wishing to do things thor-
oughly, began with an essay on the Primitive Pig,
the Mythology of the Pig, and the Dravidian Pig.
Nafferton filed that information— twenty-seven fools-
cap sheets — and desired to know about the distribu-
tion of the Pig in the Punjab, and how it stood the
Plains in the hot weather. From this point onwards,
remember that I am giving you only the barest outUnes
of the affair — the guy-ropes, as it were, of the hideous
web that Nafferton spun round Pinecoffin.

Pinecoffin made a coloured Pig-population map, and
collected observations on the comparative longevity of
Pig (a) in the sub-montane tracts of the Himalayas
and (b) in the Rechna Doab. Nafferton filed that, and
asked what sort of people looked after Pig. This
started an ethnological excursus on swineherds, and
drew from Pinecoffin long tables showing the propor-
tion per thousand of that caste in the Derajat. Naffer-
ton filed the bundle, and explained that the figures
which he wanted referred to the Cis-Sutlej states,

822 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

where he understood that Pigs were very fine and
large, and where he proposed to start a Piggery. By
this time, Government had quite forgotten their in-
structions to Mr. Pinecoffin. They were hke the
gentlemen, in Keats' poem, who turned well-oiled wheels
to skin other people. But Pinecoffin was just entering
into the spirit of the Pig-hunt; as Nafferton well knew
he would do. He had a fair amount of work of his
own to clear away; but he sat up of nights reducing Pig
to five places of decimals for the honour of his Service.
He was not going to appear ignorant of so easy a subject
as Pig.

Then Government sent him on special duty to Kohat.
lo 'inquire into' the big, seven-foot, iron-shod spade'^
of that District. People had been killing each other
with those peaceful tools; and Government wished to
know 'whether a modified form of agricultural imple-
ment could not, tentatively and as a temporary measure,
be introduced among the agricultural population without
needlessly or unduly exacerbating the existing religious
sentiments of the peasantry.'

Between those spades and Nafferton's Pig, Pinecoffin
was rather heavily burdened.

Nafferton now began to take up '{a) The food-
supply of the indigenous Pig, Avith a view to the im-
provement of its capacities as a flesh-former, (b) The
acclimatisation of the exotic Pig, maintaining its dis-
tinctive peculiarities.' Pinecoffin replied exhaustively
that the exotic Pig would become m^erged in the in-
digenous type; and quoted horse-breeding statistics to
prove this. The side issue was debated, at great length
on Pinecoffin's side, till Nafferton owned that he had

PIG 223

been in the wrong, and moved the previous question.
When Pinecoffin had quite written himself out about
flesh-formers, and fibrins, and glucose and the nitro-
genous constituents of maize and lucerne, Nafferton
raised the question of expense. By this time Pinecoffin,
who had been transferred from Kohat, had developed a
Pig theory of his own, which he stated in thirty-three
foho pages — all carefully filed by Nafferton. Who
asked for more.

These things covered ten months, and Pinecoffin's
interest in the potential Piggery seemed to die down
after he had stated his own views. But Nafferton
bombarded him with letters on 'the Imperial aspect of
the scheme, as tending to officialise the sale of pork,
and thereby calculated to give offence to the Moham-
medan population of Upper India.' He guessed that
Pinecoffin would want some broad, free-hand work
after his niggfing, decimal details. Pinecoffin handled
the latest development of the case in masterly style,
and proved that no ^popular ebullition of excitement
was to be apprehended.' Nafferton said that there
was nothing hke Civihan insight in matters of this
kind, and lured him up a by-path — Hhe possible profits
to accrue to the Government from the sale of hog-
bristles.' There is an extensive literature of hog-
bristles, and the shoe, brush, and colourman's trades
recognise more varieties of bristles than you would
think possible. After Pinecoffin had wondered a little
at Nafferton's rage for information, he sent back a
monograph, fifty-one pages, on 'Products of the Pig.'
This led him, under Nafferton's tender handfing, straight
to the Cawnporc factories, the trade in hog-skin for

«24 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

saddles — and thence to the tanners. Pinecoffin wrote
that pomegranate-seed was the best cure for hog-skin,
and suggested — for the past fourteen months had wearied
him — that Nafferton should 'raise his pigs before he
tanned them.'

Nafferton went back to the second section of his
fifth question. How could the exotic Pig be brought
to give as much pork as it did in the West and yet
'assume the essentially hirsute characteristics of its
Oriental congener'? Pinecoffin felt dazed, for he had
forgotten what he had written sixteen months before,
and fancied that he was about to reopen the entire
question. He was too far involved in the hideous
tangle to retreat, and, in a weak moment, he wrote,
'Consult my first letter.' Which related to the Dravi-
dian Pig. As a matter of fact, Pinecoffin had still to
reach the acclimatisation stage; having gone off on a
side issue on the merging of types.

Then Nafferton really unmasked his batteries! He
complained to the Government, in stately language, of
'the paucity of help accorded to me in my earnest at-
tempts to start a potentially remunerative industry, and
the flippancy with which my requests for information are
treated by a gentleman whose pseudo-scholarly attain-
ments should at least have taught him the primary
differences between the Dravidian and the Berkshire
variety of the genus Sus. If I am to understand that the
letter to which he refers me, contains his serious views on
the acclimatisation of a valuable, though possibly un-
cleanly, animal, I am reluctantly compelled to believe,'
etc. etc.

There was a new man at the head of the Department of

PIG 225

Castigation. The wretched Pinecoffin was told that the
Service was made for the Country, and not the Country
for the Service, and that he had better begm to supply
information about Pigs.

Pinecoffin answered insanely that he had written every-
thing that could be written about Pig, and that some
furlough was due to him.

Nafferton got a copy of that letter, and sent it, with the
essay on the Dravidian Pig, to a down-country paper
which printed both in full. The essay was rather high-
flown; but if the Editor had seen the stacks of paper, in
Pinecofhn's handwriting, on Nafferton's table, he would
not have been so sarcastic about the ' nebulous discursive-
ness and blatant seK-sufficiency of the modern Competi-
tion-wallah, and his utter mability to grasp the practical
issues of a practical question.' Many friends cut out
these remarks and sent them to Pinecofhn.

I have already stated that Pinecoffin came of a soft
stock. This last stroke frightened and shook him. He
could not imderstand it; but he felt that he had been,
somehow, shamelessly betrayed by Nafferton. He
realised that he had wrapped himself up in the Pigskin
without need, and that he could not well set himself right
with his Government. All his acquaintances asked after
his 'nebulous discursiveness' or his 'blatant self-suffi-
ciency,' and this made him miserable.

He took a train and went to Nafferton, whom he had
not seen since the Pig business began. He also took the
cutting from the paper, and blustered feebly and called
Nafferton names, and then died down to a watery, weak
protest of the ' I-say-it's-too-bad-you-know' order.

Nafferton was very sympathetic.

226 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

'I'm afraid I've given you a good deal of trouble,
haven't I? ' said he.

* Trouble!' whimpered Pinecoffin; 'I don't mind the
trouble so much, though that was bad enough, but what I
resent is this showing up in print. It will stick to me like
a burr all through my service. And I did do my best for
your interminable swine. It's too bad of you — on my
soul it is!'

'I don't know,' said Nafferton. 'Have you ever been
stuck with a horse? It isn't the money I mind, though
that is bad enough, but what I resent is the chaff that
follows, especially from the boy who stuck me. But I
think we'll cry quits now.'

Pinecojfin found nothing to say save bad words; and
Nafferton smiled ever so sweetly, and asked him to
dinner. ' '

THE ROUT OF THE WHITE HUSSARS

It was not in the open fight

We threw away the sword,
But in the lonely watching

In the darkness by the ford.
The waters lapped, the night-wind blew,
Full-armed the Fear was born and grew,
And we were flying ere we knew

From panic in the night.

— Beoni Bar.

Some people hold that an English Cavalry regiment can-
not run. This is a mistake. I have seen four hundred
and thirty-seven sabres flying over the face of the country
in abject terror — have seen the best Regiment that ever
drew bridle wiped off the Army List for the space of two
hours. If you repeat this tale to the White Hussars
they will, in all probability, treat you severely. They
are not proud of the incident.

You may know the White Hussars by their 'side/
which is greater than that of all the Cavalry Regiments
on the roster. If this is not a sufficient mark, you may
know them by their old brandy. It has been sixty years
in the Mess and is worth going far to taste. Ask for the
'McGaire' old brandy, and see that you get it. If the
Mess Sergeant thinks that you are uneducated, and that
the genuine article wiU be lost on you, he will treat you
accordingly. He is a good man. But, when you are at

227

228 PLAIN TALES FROM THE fflLLS

Mess, you must never talk to your hosts about forced
marches or long-distance rides. The Mess are very
sensitive; and, if they think that you are laughing at
them, will tell you so.

As the White Hussars say, it was all the Colonel's fault.
He was a new man, and he ought never to have taken the
Command. He said that the Regiment was not smart
enough. This to the White Hussars, who knew that they
could walk round any Horse and through any Guns and
over any Foot on the face of the earth! That insult was
the first cause of offence.

Then the Colonel cast the Dnma-Horse — the Drum-
Horse of the White Hussars! Perhaps you do not see
what an unspeakable crime he had committed. I will try
to make it clear. The soul of the Regiment lives in the
Drum-Horse who carries the silver kettle-drums. He is
nearly always a big piebald Waler. That is a point of
honour; and a Regiment will spend anything you please
on a piebald. He is beyond the ordinary laws of casting.
His work is very light, and he only manoeuvres at a foot-
pace wherefore, so long as he can step out and look
handsome, his wellbeing is assured. He knows more
about the Regiment than the Adjutant, and could not
make a mistake if he tried.

The Drum-Horse of the White Hussars was only
eighteen years old, and perfectly equal to his duties. He
had at least six years' more work in him, and carried him-
seK with all the pomp and dignity of a Drum-Major of
the Guards. The Regiment had paid Rs. 1200 for him.

But the Colonel said that he must go, and he was cast
in due form and replaced by a washy, bay beast, as ugly
as ?J. mule, with a ewe-neck, rat-tail, and cow-hocks. The

THE ROUT OF THE WHITE HUSSARS 229

Drummer detested that animal, and the best of the Band-
horses put back their ears and showed the whites of their
eyes at the very sight of him. They knew him for an up-
start and no gentleman. I fancy that the Colonel's
ideas of smartness extended to the Band, and that he
wanted to make it take part in the regular parade move-
ments. A Cavalry Band is a sacred thing. It only turns
out for Commanding Ofhcers' parades, and the Band
Master is one degree more important than the Colonel.
He is a High Priest and the ' Keel Row ' is his holy song.
The 'Keel Row' is the Cavalry Trot; and the man who
has never heard that tune rising above the rattle of the
Regiment going past the saluting-base, has something yet
to understand.

WTien the Colonel cast the Drum-Horse of the White
Hussars, there was nearly a mutiny.

The officers were angry, the Regiment were furious,
and the Bandsmen swore— like troopers. The Drum-
Horse was going to be put up to auction — public auction
— to be bought, perhaps, by a Parsee and put into a cart!
It was worse than exposing the inner Hfe of the Regiment
to the whole world, or selling the Mess Plate to a Jew —
a Black Jew.

The Colonel was a mean man and a bully. He knew
what the Regiment thought about his action; and, wher
the troopers offered to buy the Drum-Horse, he said that
their offer was mutinous and forbidden by the Regula-
tions.

But one of the Subalterns — Hogan-Yale. an Irishman
— bought the Drum-Horse for Rs. 160 at the sale: and the
Colonel was wroth. Yale professed repentance — he was
imnaturally submissive — and said that, as he had only

230 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

made the purchase to save the horse from possible ill-
treatment and starvation, he would now shoot him and
end the business. This appeared to soothe the Colonel,
for he wanted the Drum-Horse disposed of. He felt that
he had made a mistake, and could not of course acknowl-
edge it. Meantime, the presence of the Drum-Horse was
an annoyance to him.

Yale took to himself a glass of the old brandy, three
cheroots, and his friend Martyn; and they all left the
Mess together. Yale and Martyn conferred for two
hours in Yale's quarters; but only the bull- terrier who
keeps watch over Yale's boot-trees knows what they said.
A horse, hooded and sheeted to his ears, left Yale*s
stables and was taken, very unwillingly, into the Civil
Lines. Yale's groom went with him. Two men broke
into the Regimental Theatre and took several paint-pots
and some large scenery-brushes. Then night fell over
the cantonments, and there was a noise as of a horse kick-
ing his loose-box to pieces in Yale's stables. Yale had a
big, old, white Waler trap-horse.

The next day was a Thursday, and the men, hearing
that Yale was going to shoot the Drum-Horse in the
evening, determined to give the beast a regular regimental
funeral — a finer one than they would have given the
Colonel had he died just then. They got a bullock-cart
and some sacking, and mounds and mounds of roses, and
the body, under sacking, was carried out to the place
where the anthrax cases were cremated; two- thirds of the
Regiment following. There was no Band, but they aU
sang 'The Place where the old Horse died' as something
respectful and appropriate to the occasion. When the
corpse was dumped into the grave and the men began

THE ROUT OF THE WHITE HUSSARS 231

throwing down armfuls of roses to cover it, the Farrier-
Sergeant ripped out an oath and said aloud, ^Why, it
ain't the Drum-Horse any more than it's me!' The
Troop-Sergeant-Majors asked him whether he had left
his head in the Canteen. The Farrier-Sergeant said that
he knew the Drum-Horse's feet as well as he knew his
own; but he was silenced when he saw the regimental
number burnt in on the poor stiff, upturned near-fore.

Thus was the Drum-Horse of the White Hussars buried;
the Farrier-Sergeant grumbling. The sacking that
covered the corpse was smeared in places with black paint;
and the Farrier-Sergeant drew attention to this fact. But
the Troop-Sergeant-Major of E Troop kicked him se-
verely on the shin, and told him that he was undoubtedly
drunk.

On the Monday following the burial, the Colonel
sought revenge on the White Hussars. Unfortunately,
being at that time temporarily in Conmiand of the
Station, he ordered a Brigade field-day. He said that he
wished to make the Regiment ' sweat for their damned in-
solence,' and he carried out his notion thoroughly. That
Monday was one of the hardest days in the memory of the
White Hussars. They were thrown against a skeleton-
enemy, and pushed forward, and withdrawn, and dis-
mounted, and 'scientifically handled' in every possible
fashion over the dusty country, till they sweated pro-
fusely. Their only amusement came late in the day
when they fell upon the battery of Horse Artillery and
chased it for two miles. This was a personal question, and
most of the troopers had money on the event; the Gun-
ners saying openly that they had the legs of the White
Haissar;s. They were wrong. A march-past concluded

«32 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

the campaign, and when the Regunent got back to their
Lines, the men were coated with dirt from spur to chin-
strap.

The White Hussars have one great and peculiar
privilege. They won it at Fontenoy, I think.

Many Regiments possess special rights such as wear-
ing collars with undress uniform, or a bow of riband
between the shoulders, or red and white roses in their
helmets on certain days of the year. Some rights are
connected with regimental saints, and some with regi-
mental successes. All are valued highly; but none so
highly as the right of the White Hussars to have the
Band playing when their horses are being watered in the
Lines. Only one tune is played, and that tune never
varies. I don't know its real name, but the \\niite Hus-
sars call it, 'Take me to London again.' It sounds
very pretty. The Regiment would sooner be struck off
the roster than forego their distinction.

After the 'dismiss' was sounded, the officers rode
off home to prepare for stables; and the men filed into
the lines riding easy. That is to say, they opened their
tight buttons, shifted their helmets, and began to joke or
to swear as the humour took them; the more careful
slipping off and easing girths and curbs. A good trooper
values his mount exactly as much as he values himself,
and believes, or should believe, that the two together
are irresistible where women or men, girls or guns, are
concerned.

Then the Orderly-Officer gave the order, 'Water
horses,' and the Regiment loafed off to the squadron-
troughs which were in rear of the stables and between
these and the barracks. There were four huge troughs

i THE ROOT OF THE WHITE HUSSARS 233

one for each squadron, arranged en echelon^ so that the
whole Regiment could water in ten minutes if it liked.
But it lingered for seventeen, as a rule, while the Band
played.

The Band struck up as the squadrons filed off to the
troughs, and the men slipped their feet out of the stirrups
and chaffed each other. The sun was just setting in a
big, hot bed of red cloud, and the road to the Civil Lines
seemed to run straight into the sun's eye. There was a
little dot on the road. It grew and grew till it showed
as a horse, with a sort of gridiron-thing on his back.
The red cloud glared through the bars of the gridiron.
Some of the troopers shaded their eyes with their hands
and said— 'What the mischief 'as that there 'orse got
on 'im?'

In another minute they heard a neigh that every
soul — ^horse and man — in the Regiment knew, and
saw, heading straight towards the Band, the dead Drum-
Horse of the White Hussars!

On his withers banged and bumped the kettle-drimis
draped in crape, and on his back, very stiff and soldierly,
sat a bareheaded skeleton.

The Band stopped playing, and, for a moment, there
was a hush.

Then some one in E Troop — men said it was the
Troop-Sergeant-Major — swung his horse round and
yelled. No one can account exactly for what happened
afterwards; but it seems that, at least, one man in
each troop set an example of panic, and the rest followed
like sheep. The horses that had barely put their muz-
zles into the troughs reared and capered; but as soon as
the Band broke, which it did when the ghost of the

234 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

Drum-Horse was about a furlong distant, all hooves
followed suit, and the clatter of the stampede — quite
different from the orderly throb and roar of a movement
on parade, or the rough horse-play of watering in camp
— made them only more terrified. They felt that the
men on their backs were afraid of something. When
horses once know that, all is over except the butchery.

Troop after troop turned from the troughs and ran
— anywhere and everywhere — like spilt quicksilver.
It was a most extraordinary spectacle, for men and
horses were in all stages of easiness, and the carbine-
buckets flopping against their sides urged the horses on.
Men were shouting and cursing, and trying to pull clear
of the Band which was being chased by the Drum-
Horse, whose rider had fallen forward and seemed to be
spurring for a wager.

The Colonel had gone over to the Mess for a drink.
Most of the officers were with him, and the Subaltern
of the Day was preparing to go down to the Lines, and
receive the watering reports from the Troop-Sergeant-
Majors. When 'Take me to London again' stopped,
after twenty bars, every one in the Mess said, 'What
on earth has happened? ' A minute later, they heard un-
military noises, and saw, far across the plain, the White
Hussars scattered, and broken, and flying.

The Colonel was speechless with rage, for he thought
that the Regiment had risen against him or was unani-
mously drunk. The Band, a disorganised mob, tore
past, and at its heels laboured the Drum-Horse — the
dead and buried Drum-Horse — with the jolting, clat-
tering skeleton. Hogan-Yale whispered softly to Mar-
tyn — *No wire wiU stand that treatment,' and the Band,

THE ROUT OF THE WHITE HUSSARS 23S

which had doubled like a hare, came back again. But
the rest of the Regiment was gone, was rioting all over
the Province, for the dusk had shut in and each man was
howling to his neighbour that the Drmn-Horse was on
his flank. Troop-horses are far too tenderly treated as a
rule. They can, on emergencies, do a great deal, even
with seventeen stone on their backs. As the troopers
found out.

How long this panic lasted I cannot say. I believe
that when the moon rose the men saw they had nothing
to fear, and, by twos and threes and half-troops, crept
back into Cantonments very much ashamed of them-
selves. Meantime, the Drum-Horse, disgusted at hi:
treatment by old friends, pulled up, wheeled round, anu
trotted up to the Mess verandah-steps for bread. No
one liked to run; but no one cared to go forward till
the Colonel made a movement and laid hold of the
skeleton's foot. The Band had halted some distance
away, and now came back slowly. The Colonel called
it, individually and collectively, every evil name that
occurred to him at the time; for he had set his hand
on the bosom of the Drum-Horse and found flesh and
blood. Then he beat the kettle-drums with his clenched
fist, and discovered that they were but made of silvered
paper and bamboo. Next, still swearing, he tried to
drag the skeleton out of the saddle, but found that it
had been wired into the cantle. The sight of the
Colonel, with his arms round the skeleton's pelvis and
his knee in the old Drum-Horse's stomach, was striking.
Not to say amusing. He worried the thing off in a
minute or two, and threw it down on the ground, saying
to the Band— 'Here, you curs, that's what you're

356 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS ,

afraid of.' The skeleton did not look pretty in the
twilight. The Band-Sergeant seemed to recognise it,
for he began to chuckle and choke. 'Shall I take it
away, sir?' said the Band-Sergeant. 'Yes,' said the
Colonel, ' take it to Hell, and ride there yourselves!'

The Band-Sergeant saluted, hoisted the skeleton
across his saddle-bow, and led ojff to the stables. Then
the Colonel began to make inquiries for the rest of the
Regiment, and the language he used was wonderful.
He would disband the Regiment — he would court-martial
every soul in it — he would not command such a set of
rabble, and so on, and so on. As the men dropped in,
his language grew wilder, until at last it exceeded the
utmost limits of free speech allowed even to a Colonel of
Horse.

Martyn took Hogan-Yale aside and suggested com-
pulsory retirement from the Service as a necessity when
all was discovered. Martyn was the weaker man of
the two. Hogan-Yale put up his eyebrows and re-
marked, firstly, that he was the son of a Lord, and,
secondly, that he was as innocent as the babe unborn
of the theatrical resurrection of the Drum-Horse.

'My instructions,' said Yale, with a singularly sweet
smile, 'were that the Drum-Horse should be sent back
as impressively as possible. I ask you, am I respon-
sible if a mule-headed friend sends him back in such a
manner as to disturb the peace of mind of a regiment
of Her Majesty's Cavalry? '

Martyn said, 'You are a great man, and will in time
become a General; but I'd give my chance of a troop
to be safe out of this affair.'

Providence saved Martyn and Hogan-Yale. The

THE ROUT OF THE WHITE HUSSARS 237

Second-in-Command led the Colonel away to the little
curtained alcove wherein the Subalterns of the White
Hussars were accustomed to play poker of nights; and
there, after many oaths on the Colonel's part, they
talked together in low tones. I fancy that the Second-
in-Command must have represented the scare as the
work of some trooper whom it would be hopeless to
detect; and I know that he dwelt upon the sin and
the shame of making a public laughing-stock of the
scare.

'They will call us,' said the Second-in-Command,
who had a fine imagination — Hhey will call us the
''Fly-by-Nights"; they will call us the ''Ghost Hunt-
ers"; they will nickname us from one end of the Army
List to the other. All the explanation in the world
won't make outsiders understand that the officers were
away when the panic began. For the honour of the
Regiment and for your own sake keep this thing quiet.'

The Colonel was so exhausted with anger that sooth-
ing him down came easier than might be imagined.
He was made to see, gently and by degrees, that it
was obviously impossible to court-martial the whole
Regiment, and equally impossible to proceed against
any subaltern who, in his belief, had any concern in
the hoax.

'But the beast's alive! He's never been shot at
all!' shouted the Colonel. 'It's flat flagrant diso-
bedience! I've known a man broke for less — dam
sight less. They're mocking me, I tell you, Mutman!
They're mocking me!'

Once more, the Second-in-Command set himself to
soothe the Colonel, and wrestled with him for half an

238 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

hour. At the end of that time, the Regimental Sergeant-
Major reported himself. The situation was rather
novel to him; but he was not a man to be put out by
circumstances. He saluted and said, ^Regiment all
come back, Sir.' Then, to propitiate the Colonel — 'An'
none of the 'orses any the worse, Sir.'

The Colonel only snorted and answered — 'You'd
better tuck the men into their cots, then, and see that
they don't wake up and cry in the night.' The Ser-
geant withdrew.

His Httle stroke of humour pleased the Colonel, and,
further, he felt slightly ashamed of the language he had
been using. The Second-in-Command worried him
again, and the two sat talking far into the night.

Next day but one, there was a Commanding Officer's
parade, and the Colonel harangued the White Hussars
vigorously. The pith of his speech was that, since
the Drum-Horse in his old age had proved himself
capable of cutting up the whole Regiment, he should
return to his post of pride at the head of the Band,
but the Regiment were a set of ruffians with bad con-
sciences.

The White Hussars shouted, and threw everything
movable about them into the air, and when the parade
was over, they cheered the Colonel till they couldn't
speak. No cheers were put up for Lieutenant Hogan-
Yale, who smiled very sweetly in the background.

Said the Second-in-Command to the Colonel, unoffi-
cially—

'These little things ensure popularity, and do not
the least affect discipline.'

*But I went back on my word,' said the Colonel.

THE ROUT OF THE WHITE HUSSARS 239

'Never mind,' said the Second-in-Command. 'The
White Hussars will follow you anywhere from to-day.
Regiments are just like women. They will do anything
for trinketry.'

A week later, Hogan-Yale received an extraordinary
letter from some one who signed himseK 'Secretary,
Chanty and Zeal, 3709, E.C.,' and asked for 'the return
of our skeleton which we have reason to believe is in
your possession.'

'Who the deuce is this lunatic who trades in bones?*
said Hogan-Yale.

'Beg your pardon, Sir,' said the Band-Sergeant, 'but
the skeleton is with me, an' I'll return it if you'll pay the
carriage into the Civil Lines. There's a coffin with it,
Sir.'

Hogan-Yale smiled and handed two rupees to the Band-
Sergeant, saying, 'Write the date on the skull, will you?'

If you doubt this story, and know where to go, you can
see the date on the skeleton. But don't mention the
matter to the White Hussars.

I happen to know something about it, because I pre-
pared the Dnmi-Horse for his resurrection. He did not
take kindly to the skeleton at all.

THE BRONCKHORST DIVORCE-CASE

In the daytime, when she moved about me,

In the night, when she was sleeping at my side, —
I was wearied, I was wearied of her presence,
Day by day and night by night I grew to hate her —
Would God that she or I had died!

— Confessions.

There was a man called Bronckhorst — a three-cornered,
middle-aged man in the Army — gray as a badger, and,
some people said, with a touch of country-blood in him.
That, however, cannot be proved. Mrs. Bronckhorst was
not exactly young, though fifteen years younger than her
husband. She was a large, pale, quiet woman, with heavy
eyehds over weak eyes, and hair tiiat turned red or yellow
as the Hghts fell on it.

Bronckhorst was not nice in any way. He had no re-
spect for the pretty public and private Hes that make life
a Httle less nasty than it is. His manner towards his wife
was coarse. There are many things — including actual
assault with the clenched fist — that a wife will endure;
but seldom a wife can bear — as Mrs. Bronckhorst bore —
with a long course of brutal, hard chaff, making Hght of her
weaknesses, her headaches, her small fits of gaiety, her
dresses, her que ii httle attempts to make herself attrac-
tive to her husband when she knows that she is not what
she has been, and — worst of all — the love that she spends

240

THE BRONCKHORST DIVORCE-CASE 241

on her children. That particular sort of heavy-handed
jest was specially dear to Bronckhorst. I suppose that
he had first slipped into it, meaning no harm, in the honey-
moon, when folk find their ordinary stock of endearments
run short, and so go to the other extreme to express their
f eeUngs. A similar impulse makes a man say, ' Hutt, you
old beast I' when a favourite horse nuzzles his coat-front.
Unluckily, when the reaction of marriage sets in, the form
of speech remains, and, the tenderness having died out,
hurts the wife more than she cares to say. But Mrs.
Bronckhorst was devoted to her 'Teddy' as she called
him. Perhaps that was why he objected to her. Perhaps
—this is only a theory to account for his infamous be-
haviour later on — he gave way to the queer, savage feel-
ing that sometimes takes by the throat a husband twenty
years married, when he sees, across the table, the same
same face of his wedded wife, and knows that, as he has
sat facing it, so must he continue to sit until the day of its
death or his own. Most men and all women know the
spasm. It only lasts for three breaths as a rule, must be
a ' throwback' to times when men and women were rather
worse than they are now, and is too unpleasant to be
discussed.

Dinner at the Bronckhorsts' was an mfliction few men
cared to undergo. Bronckhorst took a pleasure in saying
things that made his wife wince. When their Httle boy
came in at dessert, Bronckhorst used to give him half a
glass of wine, and naturally enough, the poor little mite
got first riotous, next miserable, and was removed
screaming. Bronckhorst asked if that was the way Teddy
usually behaved, and whether Mrs. Bronckhorst could
not spare some of her time Ho teach the little beggar

342 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

decency.' Mrs. Bronckliorst, who loved the boy more
than her own life, tried not to cry — her spirit seemed to
have been broken by her marriage. Lastly, Bronckhorst
used to say, 'There! that'll do, that'll do. For God's
sake try to behave like a rational woman. Go into the
drawing-room.' Mrs. Bronckhorst would go, trying to
carry it all off with a smile; and the guest of the evening
would feel angry and uncomfortable.

After three years of this cheerful life — for Mrs. Bronck-
horst had no women-friends to talk to — the Station waf
startled by the news that Bronckhorst had instituted pro-
ceedings on the criminal count, against a man called Biel,
who certainly had been rather attentive to Mrs. Bronck-
horst whenever she had appeared in pubhc. The utter
want of reserve with which Bronckhorst treated his own
dishonour helped us to know that the evidence against
Biel would be entirely circumstantial and native. There
were no letters; but Bronckhurst said openly that he
would rack Heaven and Earth until he saw Biel superin-
tending the manufacture of carpets in the Central Jail.
Mrs. Bronckhorst kept entirely to her house, and let
charitable folks say what they pleased. Opinions were
divided. Some two-thirds of the Station jumped at once
to the conclusion that Biel was guilty; but a dozen men
who knew and liked him held by him. Biel was furious
and surprised. He denied the whole thing, and vowed
that he would thrash Bronckhorst within an inch of his
life. No jury, we knew, would convict a man on the
criminal count on native evidence in a land where you cau
buy a murder-charge, including the corpse, all complete
for fifty-four rupees; but Biel did not care to scrape,
through by the benefit of a doubt. He wanted th?

THE BRONCKHORST DIVORCE-CASE 243

whole thing cleared; but, as he said one night — 'He can
prove anything with servants' evidence, and I've only my
bare word.' This was almost a month before the case
came on; and beyond agreeing with Biel, we could do
little. All that we could be sure of was that the native
evidence would be bad enough to blast Biel's character for
the rest of his service; for when a native begins perjury he
perjures himself thoroughly. He does not boggle over
details.

Some genius at the end of the table whereat the affair
was being talked over, said, 'Look here! I don't believe
lawyers are any good. Get a man to wire to Strickland,
and beg him to come down and pull us through.'

Strickland was about a hundred and eighty miles up
the line. He had not long been married to Miss Youghal,
but he scented in the telegram a chance of return to the
old detective work that his soul lusted after, and next
night he came in and heard our story. He finished his
pipe and said oracularly, *We must get at the evidence.
Oorya bearer, Mussulman khit and sweeper ayah^ I
suppose, are the pillars of the charge. I am on in this
piece; but I'm afraid I'm getting rusty in my talk.'

He rose and went into Biel's bedroom, where his tnmk
had been put, and shut the door. An hour later, we
heard him say, 'I hadn't the heart to part with my old
make-ups when I married. Will this do? ' There was a
\o\he[y faquir salaaming in the doorway.

'Now lend me fifty rupees,' said Strickland, 'and give
me your Words of Honour that you won't tell my wife.'

He got all that he asked for, and left the house while
the table drank his health. What he did only he himself
knows. A faquir hung about Bronckhorst's compound

•44 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

for twelve days. Then a sweeper appeared, and wken
Biel heard of him, he said that Strickland was an angel
full-fledged. Whether the sweeper made love to Janki,
Mrs. Bronckhorst's ayah, is a question which concerns
Strickland exclusively.

He came back at the end of three weeks, and said
quietly, *You spoke the truth, Biel. The whole business
is put up from beginning to end. 'Jove! It almost
astonishes me ! That Bronckhorst-beast isn't fit to live.'

There was uproar and shouting, and Biel said, 'How
are you going to prove it? You can't say that you've
been trespassing on Bronckhorst's compound in disguise!'

' No,' said Strickland. ' Tell your lawyer-fool, whoever
he is, to get up something strong about '* inherent im-
probabilities" and "discrepancies of evidence." He
won't have to speak, but it will make him happy. Fm
going to run this business.'

Biel held his tongue, and the other men waited to see
what would happen. They trusted Strickland as men
trust quiet men. When the case came off the Court was
crowded. Strickland himg about in the verandah of the
Court, till he met the Mohammedan khitmatgar. Then he
murmured a faquir's blessing in his ear, and asked him
how his second wife did. The man spun round, and, as he
looked into the eyes of ' Estreeken Sahib,' his jaw dropped.
You must remember that before Strickland was married,
he was, as I have told you already, a power among
natives. Strickland whispered a rather coarse vernacular
proverb to the effect that he w^as abreast of all that was
going on and went into the Court armed with a gut
trainer's-wliip.

The Mohammedan was the first witness and Strickland

THE BRONCKHORST DIVORCE-CASE 24S

beamed upon him from the back of the Court. The man
moistened his lips with his tongue and, in his abject fear
of 'Estreeken Sahib' the faquir, went back on every de-
tail of his evidence — said that he was a poor man and God
was his witness that he had forgotten everything that
Bronckhorst Sahib had told him to say. Between his
terror of Strickland, the Judge, and Bronckhorst, he col-
lapsed weeping.

Then began the panic among the witnesses. Janki, the
ayah, leering chastely behind her veil, turned gray, and
the bearer left the Court. He said that his Mamma was
dying and that it was not wholesome for any man to lie
imthrif tily in the presence of ' Estreeken Sahib.'

Biel said politely to Bronckhorst, ' Your witnesses don't
seem to work. Haven't you any forged letters to pro-
duce? ' But Bronckhorst was swaying to and fro in his
chair, and there was a dead pause after Biel had been
called to order.

Bronckhorst's Counsel saw the look on his client's face,
and without more ado, pitched his papers on the little
green baize table, and mumbled something about having
been misinformed. The whole Court applauded wildly,
like soldiers at a theatre, and the Judge began to say what
he thought.

Biel came out of the Court, and Strickland dropped a
gut trainer's-whip in the verandah. Ten minutes later,
Biel was cutting Bronckhorst into ribbons behind the old
Court cells, quietly and without scandal. What was left
of Bronckhorst was sent home in a carriage; and his wife
wept over it and nursed it into a man again.

246 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

Later on, after Biel had managed to hush up the
counter-charge against Bronckhorst of fabricating false
evidence, Mrs. Bronckhorst, with her faint watery smile,
said that there had been a mistake, but it wasn't her
Teddy's fault altogether. She would wait till her Teddy
came back to her. Perhaps he had grown tired of her, or
she had tried his patience and perhaps we wouldn't cut
her any more, and perhaps the mothers would let their
children play with * little Teddy' again. He was so
lonely. Then the Station invited Mrs. Bronckhorst
everywhere, until Bronckhorst was fit to appear in public,
when he went Home and took his wife with him. Accord-
ing to the latest advices, her Teddy did come back to her,
and they are moderately happy. Though, of course, he
can never forgive her the thrashing that she was the in-
direct means of getting for him.

What Biel wants to know is, ^ Why didn't I press home
the charge against the Bronckhorst-brute, and have him
run in?'

What Mrs. Strickland wants to know is, *How did
my husband bring such a lovely, lovely Waler from
your Station? I know all his money-affairs; and I'm
certain he didn't buy it.'

What I want to know is, *How do women like Mrs.
Bronckhorst come to marry men like Bronckhorst?'

And my conundrum is the most unanswerable of the
three.

VENUS ANNODOMINI

And the years went on, as the years must do;
But our great Diana was always new —
Fresh, and blooming, and blonde, and fair,
With azure eyes and with aureate hair;
And all the folk, as they came or went,
Offered her praise to her heart's content.

— Diana of Ephesus.

She had nothing to do with Number Eighteen in the
Braccio Nuovo of the Vatican, between Visconti's Ceres
and the God of the Nile. She was purely an Indian
deity — an Anglo-Indian deity, that is to say — and we
called her the Venus Annodomini, to distinguish her
from other Annodominis of the same everlasting order.
There was a legend among the Hills that she had once
been young; but no living man was prepared to come
forward and say boldly that the legend was true. Men
rode up to Simla, and stayed, and went away and made
their name and did their Hfe's work, and returned again
to find the Venus Annodomini exactly as they had
left her. She was as immutable as the Hills. But not
quite so green. All that a girl of eighteen could do in the
way of riding, walking, dancing, picnicking and over-ex-
ertion generally, the Venus Annodomini did, and showed
no sign of fatigue or trace of weariness. Besides per-
petual youth, she had discovered, men said, the secret
of perpetual health; and her fame spread about the land.

247

S48 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

From a mere woman, she grew to be an Institution, inso-
much that no young man could be said to be properly
formed, who had not, at some time or another, wor-
shipped at the shrine of the Venus Annodomini. There
was no one like her, though there were many imitations.
Six years in her eyes were no more than six months to
ordinary women; and ten made less visible impression
on her than does a week's fever on an ordinary woman.
Every one adored her, and in return she was pleasant
and courteous to nearly every one. Youth had been
a habit of hers for so long, that she could not part with
it — never realised, in fact, the necessity of parting
with it — and took for her more chosen associates young
people.

Among the worshippers of the Venus Annodomini
was young Gayerson. ^Very Young Gayerson' he
was called to distinguish him from his father ^ Young'
Gayerson, a Bengal Civilian, who affected the customs
■ — as he had the heart — of youth. 'Very Young' Gay-
erson was not content to worship placidly and for form's
sake, as the other young men did, or to accept a ride or a
dance, or a talk from the Venus Annodomini in a
properly humble and thankful spirit. He was exacting,
and, therefore, the Venus Annodomini repressed him.
He worried himself nearly sick in a futile sort of way over
her; and his devotion and earnestness made him appear
either shy or boisterous or rude, as his mood might vary,
by the side of the older men who, with him, bowed before
the Venus Annodomini. She was sorry for him. He re-
minded her of a lad who, three-and-twenty years ago, had
professed a boundless devotion for her, and for whom
in return she had felt something more than a week's

VENUS ANNODOMINI 249

weakness. But that lad had fallen away and married
another woman less than a year after he had worshipped
her; and the Venus Annodomini had almost — not quite
—forgotten his name. 'Very Young' Gayerson had the
same big blue eyes and the same way of pouting his under-
lip when he was excited or troubled. But the Venus
Annodomini checked him sternly none the less. Too
much zeal was a thing that she did not approve of; pre-
ferring instead a tempered and sober tenderness.

'Very Young' Gayerson was miserable, and took
no trouble to conceal his wretchedness. He was in
the Army — a Line regiment I think, but am not certain
—and, since his face was a looking-glass and his forehead
an open book, by reason of his innocence, his brothers-
in-arms made his life a burden to him and embittered
his naturally sweet disposition. No one except 'Very
Young' Gayerson, and he never told his views, knew
how old 'Very Young' Gayerson believed the Venus
Annodomini to be. Perhaps he thought her five-and-
twenty, or perhaps she told him that she was this age.
' Very Young ' Gayerson would have forded the Indus in
flood to carry her lightest word, and had implicit faith
in her. Every one liked him, and every one was sorry
when they saw him so bound a slave of the Venus Anno-
domini. Every one, too, admitted that it was not her
fault; for the Venus Annodomini differed from Mrs.
Hauksbee and Mrs. Reiver in this particular — she never
moved a finger to attract any one; but, like Ninon de
L'Enclos, all men were attracted to her. One could ad-
mire and respect Mrs. Hauksbee, despise and avoid Mrs.
Reiver, but one was forced to adore the Venus Anno-
domini.

250 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

'Very Young' Gayerson's papa held a Division oi
a Collectorate or something administrative in a partic-
ularly unpleasant part of Bengal — full of Babus who
edited newspapers proving that * Young' Gayerson
was a 'Nero' and a 'Scylla' and a 'Charybdis'; and,
in addition to the Babus, there was a good deal of
dysentery and cholera abroad for nine months of the
year. * Young' Gayerson — he was about five-and-forty
— rather liked Babus, they amused him, but he ob-
jected to dysentery, and when he could get away,"
went to Darjiling for the most part. This particular
season he fancied that he would come up to Simla and
see his boy. The boy was not altogether pleased. He
told the Venus Annodomini that his father was coming
up, and she flushed a little and said that she should
be delighted to make his acquaintance. Then she
looked long and thoughtfully at 'Very Young' Gayer-
son, because she was very, very sorry for him, and he
was a very, very big idiot.

*My daughter is coming out in a fortnight, Mi.
Gayerson,' she said.

'Your what .?' said he.

'Daughter,' said the Venus Annodomini. 'She's
been out for a year at Home already, and I want her
to see a little of India. She is nineteen and a very
sensible nice girl I believe.'

'Very Young' Gayerson, who was a short twenty-
two years old, nearly fell out of his chair with astonish-
ment; for he had persisted in believing, against aU
belief, in the youth of the Venus Annodomini. She,
with her back in the curtained window, watched the
effect of her sentences and smiled.

VENUS ANNODOMINI 251

'Very Young* Gayerson's papa came up twelve
days later, and had not been in Simla four-and-twenty
hours before two men, old acquaintances of his, had told
him how 'Very Young' Gayerson had been conducting
himself.

'Young' Gayerson laughed a good deal, and inquired
who the Venus Annodomini might be. Which proves
that he had been Uving in Bengal, where nobody knows
anything except the rate of Exchange. Then he said
boys will be boys, and spoke to his son about the matter.
*Very Young' Gayerson said that he felt wretched
and imhappy; and * Young' Gayerson said that he re-
pented of having helped to bring a fool into the world.
He suggested that his son had better cut his leave short
and go down to his duties. This led to an unfilial an-
swer, and relations were strained, imtil 'Young' Gayer-
son demanded that they should call on the Venus
Annodomini. 'Very Young' Gayerson went with his
papa, feeling, somehow, uncomfortable and small.

The Venus Annodomini received them graciously and
' Young ' Gayerson said, ' By Jove ! It's Kitty ! ' 'Very
Young' Gayerson would have Hstened for an explanation
if his time had not been taken up with trying to talk
to a large, handsome, quiet, well-dressed girl — intro-
duced to him by the Venus Annodomini as her daughter.
She was far older in manner, style, and repose than 'Very
Young' Gayerson; and, as he realised this thing, he felt
sick.

Presently, he heard the Venus Annodomini saying,
'Do you know that your son is one of my most devoted
admirers? '

'I don't wonder,' said 'Young' Gayerson. Here he

353 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS.

raised his voice, 'He follows his fa therms footsteps.
Didn't I worship the ground you trod on, ever so long
ago, Kitty — and you haven't changed since then. How
strange it all seems!'

'Very Young' Gayerson said nothing. His con-
versation with the daughter of the Venus Annodomini
was, through the rest of the call, fragmentary and dis-
jointed.

'At five to-morrow, then,' said the Venus Anno-
domini. 'And mind you are punctual.'

'At five punctually,' said 'Young' Gayerson. 'You
can lend your old father a horse I dare say, youngster,
can't you? I'm going for a ride to-morrow afternoon.'*

'Certainly,' said 'Very Young' Gayerson. 'I am
going down to-morrow morning. My ponies are at
your service, Sir.'

The Venus Aimodomini looked at him across the
half-Hght of the room, and her big gray eyes filled with
moisture. She rose and shook hands with him.

' Good-bye, Tom,' whispered the Venus Annodomini.

THE BISARA OF POOREE

Little Blind Fish, thou art marvellous wise,
Little Blind Fish, who put out thy eyes?
Open thy ears while I whisper my wish —
Bring me a lover, thou Little Blind Fish.

— The Charm of the Bisara,

Some natives say that it came from the other side
of Kulu, where the eleven-inch Temple Sapphire is.
Others that it was made at the Devil-Shrine of Ao-
Chung in Thibet, was stolen by a Kafir, from him by a
Gurkha, from him again by a LahouH, from him by
a khitmatgar, and by this latter sold to an Englishman,
so all its virtue was lost; because, to work properly,
the Bisara of Pooree must be stolen — with bloodshed
if possible, but, at any rate, stolen.

These stories of the coming into India are all false.
It was made at Pooree ages since — the manner of its
making would fill a small book — was stolen by one of
the Temple dancing-girls there, for her own purposes,
and then passed on from hand to hand, steadily north-
ward, till it reached Hanle; always bearing the same
name — the Bisara of Pooree. In shape it is a tiny
square box of silver, studded outside with eight small
balas-rubies. Inside the box, which opens with a spring,
is a little eyeless fish, carved from some sort of dark
shiny nut and wrapped in a shred of faded gold-cloth.

3S3

aS4 PLAIN TALES FROM THE fflLLS

I'hat is the Bisara of Pooree, and it were better for a
man to take a king-cobra in his hand than to touch the
Bisara of Pooree.

All kinds of magic are out of date, and done away with
except in India, where nothing changes in spite of the
shiny, top-scum stuff that people call 'civiHsation.' Any
man who knows about the Bisara of Pooree will tell you
what its powers are — always supposing that it has been
honestly stolen. It is the only regularly working, trust-
worthy love-charm in the coimtry, with one exception.
[The other charm is in the hands of a trooper of the
Nizam's Horse, at a place called Tuprani, due north of
Hyderabad.] This can be depended upon for a fact.
Some one else may explain it.

If the Bisara be not stolen, but given or bought or found,
it turns against its owner in three years, and leads to ruin
or death. This is another fact which you may explain
when you have time. Meanwhile, you can laugh at it.
At present, the Bisara is safe on a hack-pony's neck, in-
side the blue bead-necklace that keeps off the Evil-Eye.
If the pony-driver ever finds it, and wears it, or gives it to
his wife, I am sorry for him.

A very dirty hiU-cooly woman, with goitre, owned it at
Theog in 1884. It came into Simla from the north before
ChuTton^ skhitmatgar bought it, and sold it, for three
times its silver-value, to Churton, who collected curi-
osities. The servant knew no more what he had bought
than the master; but a man looking over Churton's
collection of curiosities — Churton was an Assistant Com-
missioner, by the way — saw and held his tongue. He
was an Englishman; but knew how to believe. Which
ghows that he was different from most Englishmen. He

THE BlSAHA OF POOREE 255

knew that it was dangerous to have any share in the little
box when working or dormant; for Love unsought is a
terrible gift.

Pack — * Grubby ' Pack, as we used to call him — was, in
every way, a nasty little man who must have crawled into
the Army by mistake. He was three inches taller than
his sword, but not half so strong. And the sword was a
'ifty-shilling, tailor-made one. Nobody liked him, and, I
buppose, it was his wizenedness and worthlessness that
made him fall so hopelessly in love with Miss Hollis, who
was good and sweet, and five-foot-seven in her tennis-
shoes. He was not content with falHng in love quietly,
but brought all the strength of his miserable little
nature into the business. If he had not been so objection-
able, one might have pitied him. He vapoured, and
fretted, and fumed, and trotted up and down, and tried
to make himself pleasing in Miss Holhs' big, quiet, gray
eyes, and failed. It was one of the cases that you some-
times meet, even in our country where we marry by Code,
of a really blind attachment all on one side, without the
faintest possibility of return. Miss Hollis looked on Pack
as some sort of vermin running about the road. He had
no prospects beyond Captain's pay, and no wits to help
that out by one penny. In a large-sized man, love like
his would have been touching. In a good man, it would
have been grand. He being what he was, it was only a
nuisance.

You will believe this much. What you will not believe
is what follows: Churton, and The Man who Kjiew what
the Bisara was, were lunching at the Simla Club together.
Churton was complaining of life in general. His best
mare had rolled out of stable down the cliff and had

2S6 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS,

broken her back; his decisions were being reversed by the
upper Courts more than an Assistant Commissioner of
eight years' standing has a right to expect; he knew liver
and fever, and, for weeks past, had felt out cf sorts.
Altogether, he was disgusted and disheartened.

Simla Club dining-room is built, as all the world knows,
in two sections, with an arch-arrangement dividing them.
Come in, turn to your own left, take the table under the
window, and you cannot see any one who has come in,
turned to the right, and taken a table on the right side of
the arch. Curiously enough, every word that you say can
be heard, not only by the other diner, but by the servants
beyond the screen through which they bring dinner.
This is worth knowing; an echoing-room is a trap to be
forewarned against.

Half in fun, and half hoping to be believed. The Man
who Kjiew told Churton the story of the Bisara of Pooree
at rather greater length than I have told it to you in this
place; winding up with a suggestion that Churton might
as well throw the little box down the hill and see whether
all his troubles would go with it. In ordinary ears,
English ears, the tale was only an interesting bit of folk-
lore. Churton laughed, said that he felt better for his
tifSn, and went out. Pack had been tiffining by himself
to the right of the arch, and had heard everything. He
was nearly mad with his absurd infatuation for Miss
HolHs, that all Simla had been laughing about.

It is a curious thing that, when a man hates or loves
beyond reason, he is ready to go beyond reason to gratify
his feelings. Which he would not do for money or power
merely. Depend upon it, Solomon would never have
built altars to Ashtaroth and all those ladies with queer

THE BISARA OF POOREE 257

names, if there had not been trouble of some kind in his
zenana, and nowhere else. But this is beside the story.
The facts of the case are these: Pack called on Churton
next day when Churton was out, left his card, and stole
the Bisara of Pooree from its place under the clock on the
mantelpiece! Stole it like the thief he was by nature.
Three days later all Simla was electrified by the news that
Miss HolKs had accepted Pack — the shrivelled rat, Pack!
Do you desire clearer evidence than this? The Bisara of
Pooree had been stolen, and it worked as it had always
done when won by foul means.

There are three or four times in a man's life when he is
justified in meddling with other people's affairs to play
Providence.

The Man Who Knew felt that he was justified; but be-
Heving and acting on a belief are quite different things.
The insolent satisfaction of Pack as he ambled by the side
of Miss HolHs, and Churton's striking release from liver,
as soon as the Bisara of Pooree had gone, decided The
Man. He explained to Churton, and Churton laughed,
because he was not brought up to beheve that men on the
Government House List steal — at least little things.
But the miraculous acceptance by Miss Hollis of that
tailor. Pack, decided him to take steps on suspicion. He
vowed that he only wanted to find out where his ruby-
studded silver box had vanished to. You cannot accuse
a man on the Government House List of steaKng. And if
you rifle liis room, you are a thief yourself. Churton,
prompted by The Man who Knew, decided on burglary.
If he found nothing in Pack's room . . . but it is not
nice to think of what would have happened in that
case.

2s8 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

Pack went to a dance at Benmore — Benmore was Ben-
more in those days, and not an office — and danced fifteen
waltzes out of twenty-two with Miss Hollis. Churton
and The Man took all the keys that they could lay hands
on, and went to Pack's room in the hotel, certain that his
servants would be away. Pack was a cheap soul. He
had not purchased a decent cash-box to keep his papers
in, but one of those native imitations that you buy for
ten rupees. It opened to any sort of key, and there at the
bottom, under Pack's Insurance Policy, lay the Bisara of
Pooree!

Churton called Pack names, put the Bisara of Pooree in
his pocket, and went to the dance with The Man. At
least, he came in time for supper, and saw the beginning
of the end in Miss Hollis' eyes. She was hysterical after
supper, and was taken away by her Mamma.

At the dance, with the abominable Bisara in his pocket,
Churton twisted his foot on one of the steps leading down
to the old Rink, and had to be sent home in a 'rickshaw,
grumbling. He did not believe in the Bisara of Pooree
any the more for this manifestation, but he sought out
Pack and called him some ugly names; and ' thief was the
mildest of them. Pack took the names with the nervous
smile of a little man who wants both soul and body to
resent an insult, and went his way. There was no public
scandal.

A week later. Pack got his definite dismissal from Miss
Hollis. There had been a mistake in the placing of her
affections, she said. So he went away to Madras, where
he can do no great harm even if he lives to be a Colonel.

Churton insisted upon The Man who Knew taking the
Bisara of Pooree as a gift. The man took it, went down

THE BISARA OF POOREE 259

to the Cart-Road at once, found a cart-pony with a blue-
bead-necklace, fastened the Bisara of Pooree inside the
necklace with a piece of shoe-string, and thanked Heaven
that he was rid of a danger. Remember, in case you ever
find it, that you must not destroy the Bisara of Pooree. I
have not time to explain why just now, but the power lies
in the little wooden fish. Mister Gubematis or Max
Miiller could tell you more about it than I.

You will say that all this story is made up. Very well.
If ever you come across a little, silver, ruby-studded box,
seven-eighths of an inch long by three-quarters wide, with
a dark brown wooden fish wrapped in gold cloth, inside it,
keep it. Keep it for three years, and then you will dis-
cover for yourself whether my story is true or false.

Better still, steal it as Pack did, and you will be sorry
that you had not killed yourself in the beginning.

A FRIEND'S FRIEND

Wherefore slew you the stranger? He brought me dishonour.
I saddled my mare Bijli. I set him upon her.
I gave him rice and goat's flesh. He bared me to laughter;
When he was gone from my tent, swift I followed after,
Taking a sword in my hand. The hot wine had filled him:
Under the stars he mocked me. Therefore I killed him.

— Hadramauti.

This tale must be told in the first person for many
reasons. The man I desire to expose is Tranter of the
Bombay side. I want Tranter black-balled at his Club,
divorced from his wife, turned out of Service, and cast into
prison, until I get an apology from him in writing. I wish
to warn the world against Tranter of the Bombay side.

You know the casual way in which men pass on ac-
quaintances in India. It is a great convenience, because
you can get rid of a man you don't Hke by writing a letter
of introduction and putting him, with it, into the train.
T. G. 's are best treated thus. If you keep them moving,
they have no time to say insulting and offensive things
about 'Anglo-Indian Society.'

One day, late in the cold weather, I got a letter of
preparation from Tranter of the Bombay side, advising
me of the advent of a T. G., a man called Jevon; and say-
ing, as usual, that any kindness shown to Jevon would be
a kindness to Tranter. Every one knows the regular
form of these communications.

2tfo

A FRIEND'S FRIEND 261

Two days later, Jevon turned up with his letter of in-
troduction, and I did what I could for him. He was lint-
haired, fresh-coloured, and very English. But he held no
views about the Government of India. Nor did he
insist on shooting tigers on the Station Mall, as some T.
G.'s do. Nor did he call us ^colonists,' and dine in a
flannel-shirt and tweeds, under that delusion, as other T.
G.'s do. He was well behaved and very grateful for the
Uttle I won for him — most grateful of all when I secured
him an invitation for the Afghan Ball, and introduced him
to a Mrs. Deemes, a lady for whom I had a great respect
and admiration, who danced Hke the shadow of a leaf in a
Hght wind. I set great store by the friendship of Mrs.
Deemes; but, had I known what was coming, I would have
broken Jevon's neck with a curtain-pole before getting
him that invitation.

But I did not know, and he dined at the Club, I think,
on the night of the ball. I dined at home. When I went
to the dance, the first man I met asked me whether I had
seen Jevon. 'No,' said I. 'He's at the Club. Hasn't
he come? ' — * Come ! ' said the man. ' Yes, he's very much
come. You'd better look at him.'

I sought for Jevon. I found him sitting on a bench
and smiHng to himself and a programme. Half a look
was enough for me. On that one night, of all others, he
had begun a long and thirsty evening, by taking too
much! He was breathing heavily through his nose, his
eyes were rather red, and he appeared very satisfied with
all the earth. I put up a little prayer that the waltzing
would work off the wine, and went about feeling uncom-
fortable. But I saw Jevon walk up to Mrs. Deemes for
the first dance, and I knew that all the waltzing on the

262 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

card was not enough to keep Jevon's rebellious legs steady.
That couple went round six times. I counted. Mrs.
Deemes dropped Jevon^s arm and came across to me.

I am not going to repeat what Mrs. Deemes said to me;
because she was very angry indeed. I am not going to
write what I said to Mrs. Deemes, because I didn't say
anything. I only wished that I had killed Jevon first and
been hanged for it. Mrs. Deemes drew her pencil
through all the dances that I had booked with her, and
went away, leaving me to remember that what I ought to
have said was that Mrs. Deemes had asked to be intro-
duced to Jevon because he danced well; and that I really
had not carefully worked out a plot to insult her. But I
realised that argument was no good, and that I had better
try to stop Jevon from waltzing me into more trouble.
He, however, was gone, and every third dance I set off to
hunt for him. This ruined what little pleasure I ex-
pected from the entertainment.

Just before supper I caught him, at the buffet with his
legs wide apart, talking to a very fat and indignant
chaperone. ' If this person is a friend of yours, as I under-
stand he is, I would recommend you to take him home,'
said she. * He is unfit for decent society.' Then I knew
that goodness only knew what Jevon had been doing, and
I tried to get him away.

But Jevon wasn't going; not he. He knew what was
good for him, he did; and he wasn't going to be dictated to
by any loconial nigger-driver, he wasn't; and I was the
friend who had formed his infant mind and brought him
up to buy Benares brassware and fear God so I was; and
we would have many more blazing good drunks together,
so we would; and all the she-camels in black silk in the

A FRIEND'S FRIEND 963

world shouldn't make him withdraw his opinion that
there was nothing better than Benedictine to give one an
appetite. And then . . . but he was my guest.

I set him in a quiet corner of the supper-room, and
went to find a wall-prop that I could trust. There was a
good and kindly Subaltern — may Heaven bless that Sub-
altern, and make him a Commander-in-Chief! — who
heard of my trouble. He was not dancing himself, and
he owned a head like a five-year-old teak-baulks. He said
that he would look after Jevon till the end of the ball.

* Don't suppose you much mind what I do with him?'
said he.

'Mind!' said I. 'No! You can murder the beast if
you like.'

But the Subaltern did not murder him. He trotted ofit
to the supper-room, and sat down by Jevon, drinking peg
for peg with him. I saw the two fairly established, and
went away, feeling more easy.

When 'The Roast Beef of Old England' sounded, I
heard of Jevon's performances between the first dance and
my meeting with him at the buffet. After Mrs. Deemes
had cast him off, it seems that he had found his way into
the gallery, and offered to conduct the Band or to play
any instrument in it just as the Bandmaster pleased.

When the Bandmaster refused, Jevon said that he
wasn't appreciated, and he yearned for sympathy. So he
tnmdled downstairs and sat out four dances with four
girls, and proposed to three of them. One of the girls
was a married woman, by the way. Then he went into
the whist-room, and fell face-down and wept on the
hearth-rug in front of the fire, because he had fallen into z
den of card-sharpers, and his Mamma had always warned

264 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

him against bad company. He had done a lot of other
things, too, and had taken about three quarts of mixed
liquors. Besides speaking of me in the most scandalous
fashion!

All the women wanted him turned out, and all the men
wanted him kicked. The worst of it was, that every one
said it was my fault. Now, I put it to you, how on earth
could I have known that this mnocent, fluffy T. G. would
break out in this disgusting manner? You see he had
gone round the world nearly, and his vocabulary of abuse
was cosmopoHtan, though mainly Japanese which he had
picked up in a low tea-house at Hakodate. It sounded
like whistling.

While I was Hstening to first one man and then another
telling me of Jevon's shameless behaviour and asking me
for his blood, I wondered where he was. I was prepared
to sacrifice him to Society on the spot.

But Jevon was gone, and, far away in the corner of the
supper-room, sat my dear, good Subaltern, a Uttle flushed,
eating salad. I went over and said, ' Where's Jevon? ' —
*In the cloakroom,' said the Subaltern. 'He'll keep till
the women have gone. Don't you interfere with my
prisoner.' I didn't want to interfere, but I peeped into
the cloakroom, and found my guest put to bed on some
rolled-up carpets, all comfy, his collar free, and a wet
swab on his head.

The rest of the evening I spent in timid attempts to ex-
plain things to Mrs. Deemes and three or four other
ladies, and trying to clear my character — for I am a
respectable man — from the shameful slurs that my guest
had cast upon it. Libel was no word for what he had said.

When I wasn't trying to explain, I was running off to

A FRIEND'S FRIEND 265

the cloakroom to see that Jevon wasn't dead of apoplexy.
I didn't want him to die on my hands. He had eaten my
salt.

At last that ghastly ball ended, though I was not
in the least restored to Mrs. Deemes' favour. When
the ladies had gone, and some one was calling for songs
at the second supper, that angelic Subaltern told the
servants to bring in the Sahih who was in the cloak-
room, and clear away one end of the supper-table.
While this was being done, we formed ourselves into a
Board of Punishment with the Doctor for President.

Jevon came in on four men's shoulders, and was put
down on the table like a corpse in a dissecting-room,
while the Doctor lectured on the evils of intemperance
and Jevon snored. Then we set to work.

We corked the whole of his face. We filled his hair
with meringue-cream till it looked like a white wig. To
protect everything till it dried, a man in the Ordnance
Department, who understood the work, luted a big
blue-paper cap from a cracker, with meringue-cream,
low down on Jevon's forehead. This was punishment,
not play, remember. We took the gelatine of crackers,
and stuck blue gelatine on his nose, and yellow gelatine on
his chin, and green and red gelatine on his cheeks, press-
ing each dab down till it held as firm as goldbeaters' skin.

We put a ham-frill round his neck, and tied it in a
bow in front. He nodded like a mandarin.

We fixed gelatine on the back of his hands, and burnt-
corked them inside, and put small cutlet-frills round
his wrists, and tied both wrists together with string. We
waxed up the ends of his moustache with isinglass. He
looked very martial.

s66 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

We turned him over, pinned up his coat-tails be-
tween his shoulders, and put a rosette of cutlet-frills
there. We took up the red cloth from the ball-room
to the supper-room, and wound him up in it. There
were sixty feet of red cloth, six feet broad; and he rolled
up into a big fat bundle, with only that amazing head
sticking out.

Lastly, we tied up the surplus of the cloth beyond
his feet with cocoanut-fibre string as tightly as we knew
how. We were so angry that we hardly laughed at all.

Just as we finished, we heard the rumble of bullock-
carts taking away some chairs and things that the
General's wife had lent for the ball. So we hoisted
Jevon, like a roll of carpets, into one of the carts, and
the carts went away.

Now the most extraordinary part of this tale is that
never again did I see or hear anything of Jevon, T. G.
He vanished utterly. He was not delivered at the
General's house with the carpets. He just went into the
black darkness of the end of the night, and was swallowed
up. Perhaps he died and was thrown into the river.

But, alive or dead, I have often wondered how he
got rid of the red cloth and the meringue-cream. I
wonder still whether Mrs. Deemes will ever take any
notice of me again, and whether I shall live down the
infamous stories that Jevon set afloat about my man-
ners and customs between the first and the ninth waltz
of the Afghan Ball. They stick closer than cream.

Wherefore, I want Tranter of the Bombay side, dead
or alive. But dead for preference.

THE GATE OF THE HUNDRED SORROWS

If I can attain Heaven for a pice, why should you be envious?

— Opium Smoker's Proverb.

This is no work of mine. My friend, Gabral Misquitta,
the half-caste, spoke it all, between moonset and morn-
ing, six weeks before he died; and I took it down from
his mouth as he answered my questions. So: —

It lies between the Coppersmith's Gully and the
pipe-stem sellers' quarter, within a hundred yards, too.
as the crow flies, of the Mosque of Wazir Khan. 1
don't mind telling any one this much, but I defy hin?
to find the Gate, however well he may think he knows
the City. You might even go through the very gully
it stands in a hundred times, and be none the wiser.
We used to call the gully, 'The Gully of the Black
Smoke,' but its native name is altogether different of
course. A loaded donkey couldn't pass between the
walls; and, at one point, just before you reach the
Gate, a bulged house-front makes people go along all
sideways.

It isn't really a gate, though. It's a house. Old
Fung-Tching had it first five years ago. He was a
boot-maker in Calcutta. They say that he murdered
his wife there when he was drunk. That was why he
dropped bazar-rum and took to the Black Smoke instead.
Later on, he came up north and opened the Gate as a

z^7

a68 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

house where you could get your smoke in peace and
quiet. Mind you, it was a pukka ^ respectable opium-
house, and not one of those stifling, sweltering chandoo-
khanas, that you can find all over the City. No; the
old man knew his business thoroughly, and he was
most clean for a Chinaman. He was a one-eyed Httle
chap, not much more than five feet high, and both his
middle fingers were gone. All the same, he was the
handiest man at rolling black pills I have ever seen.
Never seemed to be touched by the Smoke, either; and
what he took day and night, night and day, was a
caution. I've been at it five years, and I can do my
fair share of the Smoke with any one; but I was a child
to Fung-Tching that way. All the same, the old man
was keen on his money: very keen; and that's what
I can't understand. I heard he saved a good deal
before he died, but his nephew has got all that now and
the old man's gone back to China to be buried.

He kept the big upper room, where his best cus-
tomers gathered, as neat as a new pin. In one corner
used to stand Fung-Tching's Joss — almost as ugly as
Fung-Tching — and there were always sticks burning
under his nose; but you never smelt 'em when the pipes
were going thick. Opposite the Joss was Fung-Tching's
coffin. He had spent a good deal of his savings on that,
and whenever a new man came to the Gate he was
always introduced to it. It was lacquered black, with
red and gold writings on it, and I've heard that Fung-
Tching brought it out all the way from China. I don't
know whether that's true or not, but I know that, if I
came first in the evening, I used to spread my mat just
at the foot of it. It was a quiet comer, you see, and a

THE GATE OF THE HUNDRED SORROWS 269

sort of breeze from the gully came in at the window now
and then. Besides the mats, there was no other furni-
ture in the room — only the coffin, and the old Joss all
green and blue and purple with age and poHsh.

Fung-Tching never told us why he called the place ' The
Gate of the Hundred Sorrows.' (He was the only China-
man I know who used bad-sounding fancy names. Most
of them are flowery. As you'll see in Calcutta.) We
used to find that out for ourselves. Nothing grows on
you so much, if you're white, as the Black Smoke. A
yellow man is made different. Opium doesn't tell on him
scarcely at all; but white and black suffer a good deal.
Of course, there are some people that the Smoke doesn't
touch any more than tobacco would at first. They just
doze a bit, as one would fall asleep naturally, and next
morning they are almost fit for work. Now, I was one oi
that sort when I began, but I've been at if for five years
pretty steadily, and it's different now. There was an old
aunt of mine, down Agra way, and she left me a Httle at
her death. About sixty rupees a month secured. Sixty
isn't much. I can recollect a time, 'seems hundreds and
hundreds of years ago, that I was getting my three
hundred a month, and pickings, when I was working on a
big timber-contract in Calcutta.

I didn't stick to that work for long. The Black Smoke
does not allow of much other business; and even though I
am very little affected by it, as men go, I couldn't do a
day's work now to save my life. After all, sixty rupees is
what I want. When old Fung-Tching was ahve he used
to draw the money for me, give me about half of it to live
on (I eat very little) , and the rest he kept himself. I was
free of the Gate at any time of the day and night, and

270 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

could smoke and sleep there when I liked, so I didn*t
care, I know the old man made a good thing out of it;
but that's no matter. Nothing matters much to me; and
besides, the money always came fresh and fresh each
month.

There was ten of us met at the Gate when the place was
first opened. Me, and two Baboos from a Government
Office somewhere in Anarkulli, but they got^the sack and
couldn't pay (no man who has to work m the dayHght can
do the Black Smoke for any length of time straight on) ; a
Chinaman that was Fung-Tching's nephew; a bazar-
woman that had got a lot of money somehow; an EngHsh
loafer — MacSomebody I think, but I have forgotten —
that smoked heaps, but never seemed to pay anything,
(they said he had saved Fung-Tching's Hfe at some trial iri
Calcutta when he was a barrister) ; another Eurasian, like
myself, from Madras; a half-caste woman, and a couple of
men who said they had come from the North. I think
they must have been Persians or Afghans or something.
There are not more than five of us living now, but we
come regular. I don't know what happened to the
Baboos; but the bazar-woman she died after six months of
the Gate, and I think Fung-Tching took her bangles and
nose-ring for himself. But I'm not certain. The English-
man, he drank as well as smoked, and he dropped off.
One of the Persians got killed in a row at night by the big
well near the mosque a long time ago, and the Police shut
up the well, because they said it was full of foul air. They
found him dead at the bottom of it. So you see, there is
only me, the Chinaman, the half-caste woman that we
call the Memsahib (she used to five with lung-Tching),
^e o|her Eurasian, and one of the Persians. The Mem-

, THE GATE OF THE HUNDRED SORROWS 271

sahih looks very old now. I think she was a young
woman when the Gate was opened; but we are all old for
the matter of that. Hundreds and hundreds of years old.
It is very hard to keep account of time in the Gate, and,
besides, time doesn't matter to me. I draw my sixty
rupees fresh and fresh every month. A very, very long
while ago, when I used to be getting three hundred and
fifty rupees a month, and pickings, on a big timber-
contract at Calcutta, I had a wife of sorts. But she's
dead now. People said that I killed her by taking to the
Black Smoke. Perhaps I did, but it's so long since that
it doesn't matter. Sometimes when I first came to the
Gate, I used to feel sorry for it; but that's all over and
done with long ago, and I draw my sixty rupees fresh and
fresh every month, and am quite happy. Not drunk
happy, you know, but always quiet and soothed and con-
tented.

How did I t^e to it? It began at Calcutta. I used to
try it in my own house, just to see what it was like. I
never went very far, but I think my wife must have died
then. Anyhow, I found myself here, and got to know
Fung-Tching. I don't remember rightly how that came
about; but he told me of the Gate and I used to go there,
and, somehow, I have never got away from it since.
Mind you, though, the Gate was a respectable place in
Fung-Tching's time where you could be comfortable, and
not at all like the chandoo-khanas where the niggers go.
No; it was clean and quiet, and not crowded. Of course,
there were others besides us ten and the man; but we
always had a mat apiece, with a wadded woollen head-
piece, all covered with black and red dragons and things;
just like the coffin in the corner.

272 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

At the end of one's third pipe the dragons used to move
about and fight. I've watched 'em many and many a
night through. I used to regulate my Smoke that way,
and now it takes a dozen pipes to make 'em stir. Besides,
they are all torn and dirty, like the mats, and old Fung-
Tching is dead. He died a couple of years ago, and gave
me the pipe I always use now — a silver one, with queer
beasts crawling up and down the receiver-bottle below the
cup. Before that, I think, I used a big bamboo stem
with a copper cup, a very small one and a green jade
mouthpiece. It was a little thicker than a walking-stick
stem, and smoked sweet, very sweet. The bamboo
seemed to suck up the smoke. Silver doesn't, and I've
got to clean it out now and then, that's a great deal of
trouble, but I smoke it for the old man's sake. He must
have made a good thing out of me, but he always gave me
clean mats and pillows, and the best stuff you could get
anywhere.

When he died, his nephew Tsin-Ung took up the Gate,
and he called it the 'Temple of the Three Possessions';
but we old ones speak of it as the ^Hundred Sorrows,' all
the same. The nephew does things very shabbily, and I
think the Memsahib must help him. She lives with him;
same as she used to do with the old man. The two let in
all sorts of low people, niggers and all, and the Black
Smoke isn't as good as it used to be. I've found burnt
bran in my pipe over and over again. The old man would
have died if that had happened in his time. Besides, the
room is never cleaned, and all the mats are torn and cut at
the edges. The coffin is gone — gone to China again —
with the old man and two ounces of Smoke inside it, in
case he should want 'em on the way.

THE GATE OF THE HUNDRED SORROWS 273

The Joss doesn't get so many sticks burnt under his
nose as he used to; that's a sign of ill-luck, as sure as
Death. He's all brown, too, and no one ever attends to
him. That's the Memsahib's work, I know; because,
when Tsin-ling tried to bum gilt paper before him, she
said it was a waste of money, and, if he kept a stick
burning very slowly, the Joss wouldn't know the differ-
ence. So now we've got the sticks mixed with a lot of
glue, and they take half an hour longer to bum, and smell
stinky. Let alone the smell of the room by itself. No
business can get on if they try that sort of thing. The
Joss doesn't Uke it. I can see that. Late at night, some-
times, he turns all sorts of queer colours — blue and green
and red — just as he used to do when old Fung-Tching
was aHve; and he rolls his eyes and stamps his feet like a
devil.

I don't know why I don't leave the place and smoke
quietly in a little room of my own in the bazar. Most
like, Tsin-ling would kill me if I went away — he draws my
sixty mpees now — and besides, it's so much trouble, and
I've grown to be very fond of the Gate. It's not much to
look at. Not what it was in the old man's time, but I
couldn't leave it. I've seen so many come in and
out. And I've seen so many die here on the mats
that I should be afraid of dying in the open now. I've
seen some things that people would call strange enough;
but nothing is strange when you're on the Black Smoke,
except the Black Smoke. And if it was, it wouldn't
matter. Fung-Tching used to be very particular about
his people, and never got in any one who'd give trouble by
dying messy and such. But the nephew isn't half so
careful. He tells everywhere that he keeps a 'first-chop '

274 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

house. Never tries to get men in ([uietly, and make them
comfortable like Fung-Tching did. That's why the Gate
is getting a little bit more known than it used to be.
Among the niggers of course. The nephew daren't get a
white, or, for matter of that, a mixed skin into the place.
He has to keep us three of course — me and the Memsahib
and the other Eurasian. We're fixtures. But he wouldn't
give us credit for a pipeful — not for anything.

One of these days, I hope, I shall die in the Gate. The
Persian and the Madras man are terribly shaky now.
They Ve got a boy to Hght their pipes for them. I always
do that myself. Most like, I shall see them carried out
before me. I don't think I shall ever outlive the Mem-
sahib or Tsin-ling. Women last longer than men at the
Black Smoke, and Tsin-ling has a deal of the old
man's blood in him, though he does smoke cheap stuff.
The bazar-woman knew when she was going two days be-
fore her time; and she died on a clean mat with a nicely
wadded pillow, and the old man hung up her pipe just
above the Joss. He was always fond of her, I fancy.
But he took her bangles just the same.

I should like to die like the bazar-woman — on a clean ^
cool mat with a pipe of good stuff between my lips. When
I feel I'm going, I shall ask Tsin-ling for them, and he can
draw my sixty rupees a month, fresh and fresh, as long as
he pleases. Then I shall lie back, quiet and comfortable,
and watch the black and red dragons have their last big
fight together; and then . . .

Well, it doesn't matter. Nothing matters much to me
— only I wish Tsin-ling wouldn't put bran into the Black
Smoke.

THE MADNESS OF PRIVATE ORTHERIS

Oh! Where would I be when my froat was dry?
Oh! Where would I be when the bullets fly?
Oh! Where would I be when I come to die?

Why,
Somewheres anigh my chum.

If 'e's liquor 'e'll give me some,

If I'm dyin' 'e'll 'old my 'ead,

An' 'e'll write 'em 'Ome when I'm dead.—

Gawd send us a trusty chum!

— Barrack-Room Ballad.

My friends Mulvaney and Ortheris had gone on a shoot-
ing-expedition for one day. Learoyd was still in hospital,
recovering from fever picked up in Burma. They sent me
an invitation to join them, and were genuinely pained
when I brought beer — almost enough beer to satisfy two
Privates of the Line . . . and Me.

"Twasn't for that we bid you welkim, Sorr/ said Mul-
vaney, sulkily. ' 'Twas for the pleasure av your company.'

Ortheris came to the rescue with — 'Well, 'e won^t be
none the worse for bringin' liquor with 'im. We ain*t a
file o' Dooks. We're bloomin' Tommies, ye cantankris
Hirishman ; an' 'eres your very good 'ealth ! ' i

We shot all the forenoon, and killed two pariah-dogs,
four green parrots, sitting, one kite by the burning-ghaut,
one snake flying, one mud-turtle, and eight crows.
Game was plentiful. Then we sat down to tiffin — * bull-
ays

276 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

mate an' bran-bread/ Mulvaney called it — by the side of
the river, and took pot shots at the crocodiles in the in-
tervals of cutting up the food with our only pocket-knife.
Then we drank up all the beer, and threw the bottles into
the v/ater and fired at them. After that, we eased belts
and stretched ourselves on the warm sand and smoked.
We were too lazy to continue shooting.

Ortheris heaved a big sigh, as he lay on his stomach
with his head between his fists. Then he swore quietly
into the blue sky.

' Fwhat's that for? ' said Mulvaney. ' Have ye not
drunk enough?'

' Tott'nim Court Road, an' a gal I fancied there. Wot's
the good of sodgerin'? '

* Orth'ris, me son,' said Mulvaney, hastily, * 'tis more
than likely you've got throuble in your inside wid
the beer. I feel that way mesilf whin my liver gets
rusty.'

Ortheris went on slowly, not heeding the interruption —

'I'm a Tommy — a bloomin', eight-anna, dog-stealin'
Tommy, with a number instead of a decent name. Wot's
the good o' me? If I 'ad a stayed at 'Ome, I might a mar-
ried that gal and a kep' a little shorp in the 'Ammersmith
'Igh.— *'S. Orth'ris, Prac-ti-cal Taxi-der-mist." With
a stuff' fox, like they 'as in the Haylesbury Dairies, in
the winder, an' a little case of blue and yaller glass-heyes,
an' a little wife to call "shorp!" ''shorp!" when the door-
bell rung. As it his, I'm on'y a Tommy — a Bloomin',
Gawd-forsaken, Beer-swillin' Tommy. "Rest on your
harms — 'versed. Stan' at — hease; 'Shun. 'Verse — harms,
Rightan'lef '—/arm. Slow — march. 'Alt—front. Rest
on your harms — 'versed. With blank-cartridge — load,'^

THE MADNESS OF PRIVATE ORTHERIS 377

An' that's the end o' me.' He was quoting fragments from
Funeral Parties' Orders.

'Stop ut!' shouted Mulvaney. *Whin you've fired
into nothin' as often as me, over a better man than your-
silf, you will not make a mock av thim orders. 'Tis
worse than whistlin' the Dead March in barricks. An'
you full as a tick, an' the sun cool, an' all an' all! I take
shame for you. You're no better than a Pagin — you an*
your firin' parties an' your glass-eyes. Won't you stop ut,
Sorr?'

What could I do? Could I tell Ortheris anything that
he did not know of the pleasures of his life? I was not a
Chaplain nor a Subaltern, and Ortheris had a right to
speak as he thought fit.

' Let him run, Mulvaney,' I said. * It's the beer.'

*No! 'Tisn't the beer,' said Mulvaney. *I know
fwhat's comin'. He's tuk this way now an' agin, an' it's
bad — it's bad — for I'm fond av the bhoy.'

Indeed, Mulvaney seemed needlessly anxious; but I
knew that he looked after Ortheris in a fatherly way.

'Let me talk, let me talk, said Ortheris, dreamily.
'D'you stop your parrit screamin' of a 'ot day, when the
cage is a-cookin' 'is pore little pink toes orf , Mulvaney? '

' Pink toes ! D'ye mane to say you've pink toes undher
your buUswools, ye blandanderin',' — Mulvaney gathered
himself together for a terrific denunciation — 'school-
misthressl Pink toes! How much Bass wid the label
did that ravin' child dhrink? '

' 'Tain't Bass,' said Ortheris. 'It's a bitterer beer nor
that. It's 'ome-sickness ! '

'Hark to him! An' he goin' Home in the Sherapis in
the inside av four months ! '

^78 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

^I don't care. It's all one to me. 'Ow d'you know
I ain't 'fraid o' dyin' 'for I gets my discharge paipers?'
He recommenced, in a sing-song voice, the Orders.

I had never seen this side of Ortheris' character before,
but evidently Mulvaney had, and attached serious im-
portance to it. While Ortheris babbled, with his head on
his arms, Mulvaney whispered to me —

'He's always tuk this way whin he's been checked over-
much by the childher they make Sarjints nowadays. That
an' havin' nothin' to do. I can't make ut out anyways.*

'Well, what does it matter? Let him talk himsell
through.'

Ortheris began singing a parody of *The Ramrod
Corps,' full of cheerful allusions to battle, murder, and
sudden death. He looked out across the river as he sang:
and his face was quite strange to me. Mulvaney caugh^
me by the elbow to insure attention.

'Matther? It matthers everything! 'Tis some sort
av fit that's on him. I've seen ut. 'Twill hould him all
this night, an' in the middle av it he'll get out av his cot
an' go rakin' in the rack for his 'coutremints. Thin he'll
come over to me an' say, "I'm goin' to Bombay. Answer
for me in the mornin'." Thin me an' him will fight as
we've done before — him to go an' me to hould him — an'
so we'll both come on the books for disturbin' in barricks.
I've belted him, an' I've bruk his head, an' I've talked to
him, but 'tis no manner av use whin the fit's on him. He's
as good a bhoy as ever stepped whin his mind's clear. I
know f what's comin', though, this night in barricks.
Lord send he doesn't loose on me whin I rise to knock him
down. 'Tis that that's in my mind day an' night.*

This put the case in a much less pleasant light, and

I

i

THE MADNESS OF PRIVATE ORTHERIS 279

fully accounted for Mulvaney's anxiety. He seemed to
be trying to coax Ortheris out of the fit; for he shouted
down the bank where the boy was lying —

* Listen now, you wid the "pore pink toes" an' the glass-
eyes ! Did you shwim the Irriwaddy at night, behin' me,
asabhoy shud;or were you hidin' under a bed, as you
was at Ahmid Kheyl? '

This was at once a gross insult and a direct lie, and Mul-
vaney meant it to bring on a fight. But Ortheris seemed
shut up in some sort of a trance. He answered slowly,
without a sign of irritation, in the same cadenced voice as
he had used for his firing-party orders —

'Hi swum the Irriwaddy in the night, as you know, for
to take the town of Lungtungpen, nakid an' without fear.
Hand where I was at Ahmed Kheyl you know, and four
bloomin' Pathans know too. But that was summat to
do, an' I didn't think o' dyin'. Now I'm sick to go 'Ome —
— go 'Ome — go 'Ome! No, I ain't mammysick, because
my uncle brung me up, but I'm sick for London again ; sick
for the sounds of 'er, an' the sights of 'er, and the stinks of
'er; orange-peel and hasphalte an' gas comin' in over
Vaux'all Bridge. Sick for the rail goin' down to Box '111,
with your gal on your knee an' a new clay pipe in your
face. That, an' die Stran' lights where you knows ev'ry
one, an' the Copper that takes you up is a old friend that
tuk you up before, when you was a little, smitchy boy
lying loose 'tween the Temple an' the Dark Harches. No
bloomin' guard-mountin', no bloomin' rotten-stone, nor
khaki, an' yourself your own master with a gal to take an'
see the Humaners practisin' a-hookin' dead corpses out of
the Serpentine o' Sundays. An' I lef ' all that for to serve
the Widder beyond the seas, where there ain't no women

38o PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

and there ain^t no liquor worth 'avin', and there ain't
nothin' to see, nor do, nor say, nor feel, nor think. Lord
love you, Stanley Orth'ris, but you're a bigger bloomin'
fool than the rest o' the reg'ment and Mulvaney wired to-
gether! There's the Widder sittin' at 'Ome with a gold
crown on 'er 'ead; and 'ere am Hi, Stanley Orth'ris, the
Widder's property, a rottin' fool I '

His voice rose at the end of the sentence, and he wound
up with a six-shot Anglo-Vernacular oath. Mulvaney
said nothing, but looked at me as if he expected that I
could bring peace to poor Ortheris' troubled brain.

I remembered once at Rawal Pindi having seen a man,
nearly mad with drink, sobered by being made a fool of.
Some regiments may know what I mean. I hoped that
we might slake off Ortheris in the same way, though he
was perfectly sober. So I said —

'What's the use of grousing there, speaking against The
Widow?'

*I didn't!' said Ortheris. 'S'elp me. Gawd, I never
said a word agin 'er, an' I wouldn't — not if I was to
desert this minute ! '

Here was my opening. 'Well, you meant to, anyhow.
What's the use of cracking-on for nothing? Would you
slip it now if you got the chance? '

' On'y try me ! ' said Ortheris, jumping to his feet as if he
had been stung.

Mulvaney jumped too. ' Fwhat are you going to do? '
said he.

'Help Ortheris down to Bombay or Karachi, whichever
he likes. You can report that he separated from you be-
fore tiffin, and left his gun on the bank here ! '

'I'm to report that— am I?' said Mulvaney, slowly.

THE MADNESS OF PRIVATE ORTHERIS 281

'Very well. If Orth'ris manes to desert now, and will
desert now, an' you, Sorr, who have been a frind to me an*
to him, will help him to ut, I, Terence Mulvaney, on my
oath which I've never bruk yet, will report as you say.

But ' here he stepped up to Ortheris, and shook the

stock of the fowling-piece in his face — 'y^^^ fistes help
you, Stanley Orth'ris, if ever I come across you agin 1 '

*I don't care!' said Ortheris. 'I'm sick o' this dorg's
life. Give me a chanst Don't play with me. Le'mego!'

'Strip,' said I, 'and change with me, and then I'll tell
you what to do.'

I hoped that the absurdity of this would check Ortheris;
but he had kicked off his ammunition-boots and got rid of
his tunic almost before I had loosed my shirt-collar.
Mulvaney gripped me by the arm —

' The fit's on him : the fit's workin' on him still ! By my
Honour and Sowl, we shall be accessiry to a desartion yet.
Only, twenty-eight days, as you say, Sorr, or fifty-six, but
think o' the shame — the black shame to him an' me!' I
had never seen Mulvaney so excited.

But Ortheris was quite calm, and, as soon as he had ex-
changed clothes with me, and I stood up a Private of the
Line, he said shortly, 'Now! Come on. What nex'?
D'ye mean fair. What must I do to get out o' this 'ere
a-HeU?'

I told him that, if he would wait for two or three hours
near the river, I would ride into the Station and come back
with one hundred rupees. He would, with that money in
his pocket, walk to the nearest side-station on the line,
about five miles away, and would there take a first-class
ticket for Karachi. Knowing that he had no money on
him when he weat out shooting, his regiment would not

..82 . PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

Immediately wire to the seaports, but would hunt for
him in the native villages near the river. Further, no
one would think of seeking a deserter in a first-class car-
riage. At Karachi, he was to buy white clothes and ship,
if he could, on a cargo-steamer.

Here he broke in. If I helped him to Karachi, he would
arrange all the rest. Then I ordered him to wait where
he was until it was dark enough for me to ride into the
Station without my dress being noticed. Now God in
His Wisdom has made the heart of the British Soldier,
who is very often an unlicked ruffian, as soft as the heart
of a Httle child, in order that he may believe in and follow
his officers into tight and nasty places. He does not so
readily come to beHeve in a ' civilian,' but, when he does,
he believes implicitly and like a dog. I had had the honour
of the friendship of Private Ortheris, at intervals, for more
than three years, and we had dealt with each other as
man by man. Consequently, he considered that all my
words were true, and not spoken lightly.

Mulvaney and I left him in the high grass near the
river-bank, and went away, still keeping to the high grass,
towards my horse. The shirt scratched me horribly.

We waited nearly two hours for the dusk to fall and
allow me to ride off. We spoke of Qitheris in whispers,
and strained our ears to catch any sound from the spot
where we had left him. But we heard nothing except the
wind in the plume-grass.

'I've bruk his head,' said Mulvaney, earnestly, Hime
an' agin. " I've nearly kilt him wid the belt, an' yet I can't
knock thim fits out av his soft head. No! An' he's not
soft, for he's reasonable an' likely by natur'. Fwhat is
ut? Is ut his breedin' which is nothin', or his edukashin

i

THE MADNESS OF PRIVATE ORTHERIS 283

which he niver got? You that think ye know things,
answer me that/

But I found no answer. I was wondering how long
Ortheris, in the bank of the river, would hold out, and
whether I should be forced to help him to desert, as I had
given my word.

Just as the dusk shut down and, with a very heavy
heart, I was beginning to saddle up my horse, we heard
wild shouts from the river.

The devils had departed from Private Stanley Ortheris,
No. 22639, B Company. The loneliness, the dusk, and
the waiting had driven them out as I had hoped. We set
off at the double and found him plunging about wildly
through the grass, with his coat off — my coat off, I mean.
He was calling for us like a madman.

When we reached him he was dripping with perspira-
tion, and trembling like a startled horse. We had great
difficulty in soothing him. He complained that he was in
civilian kit, and wanted to tear my clothes off his body. I
ordered him to strip, and we made a second exchange as
quickly as possible.

The rasp of his own 'grayback^ shirt and the squeak of
his boots seemed to bring him to himself. He put his
hands before his eyes and said —

'Wot was it? I ain't mad, I ain't sunstrook, an' I've
bin an' done an' said, and bin an' gone an' done . . .
Wot 'ave I bin an' done? '

' Fwhat have you done? ' said Mulvaney. * You've dish-
graced yourself — though that's no matter. You've dish-
graced B Comp'ny, an', worst av all, you've dishgraced
Me I Me that taught you how for to walk abroad like a
man — whin you was a dhirty little, fish-backed little,

ag4 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

whimperin' little recruity. As vou are now, Stanley
Orth^ris'/

Ortheris said nothing for a while. Then he unslung his
belt, heavy with the badges of half a dozen regiments that
bis own had lain with, and handed it over to Mulvaney.

'I'm too little for to mill you, Mulvaney,' said he, 'an'
you've strook me before; but you can take an' cut me in
two with this 'ere if you like.'

Mulvaney turned to me.

'Lave me to talk to him, Son*,' said Mulvaney.

I left, and on my way home thought a good deal over
Ortheris in particular, and my friend Private Thomas
Atkins, whom I love, in general.

But I could not come to any conclusion of any kind
whatever.

THE STORY OF MUHAMMAD DIN

Who is the happy man? He that sees in his own house at home, little
children crowned with dust, leaping and falling and crying. — Muni'
chaftdra, translated by Professor Peterson.

The polo-ball was an old one, scarred, chipped, and
dinted. It stood on the mantelpiece among the pipe-
stems which Imam Din, khitmcdgarj was cleaning for
me.

'Does the Heaven-born want this ball?' said Imam
Din, deferentially.

The Heaven-bom set no particular store by it; but of
what use was a polo-ball to dr khitmatgar ? / f ' > <

* By Your Honour's favour, I have a little son. He has
seen this ball, and desires it to play with. I do not want
it for myself.'

No one would for an instant accuse portly old Imam
Din of wanting to play with polo-balls. He carried out
the battered thing into the verandah; and there followed
a hurricane of joyful squeaks, a patter of small feet, and
the thtd-thud-thud of the ball rolling along the ground.
Evidently the little son had been waiting outside the door
to secure his treasure. But how had he managed to see
that polo-ball?

Next day, coming back from office half an hour earlier
than usual, I was aware of a small figure in the dining-
room — a tiny, plump figure in a ridiculously inadequate"

2fS

386 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

shirt, which came, perhaps, halfway down the tubby
stomach. It wandered round the room, thumb in mouth,
crooning to itself as it took stock of the pictures. Un-
doubtedly this was the ^Httle son.'

He had no business in my room, of course; but was so
deeply absorbed in his discoveries that he never noticed
me in the doorway. I stepped into the room and startled
him nearly into a fit. He sat down on the ground with a
gasp. His eyes opened, and his mouth followed suit. I
knew what was coming, and fled, followed by a long, dry
howl which reached the servants' quarters far more
quickly than any command of mine had ever done. In
ten seconds Imam Din was in the dining-room. Then
despairing sobs arose, and I returned to find Imam Din
admonishing the small sinner, who was using most of his
shirt as a handkerchief.

'This boy,' said Imam Din, judicially, *is a budmash—a.
big hudmash. He will, without doubt, go to thejail-khana
for his behaviour.' Renewed yells from the penitent and
an elaborate apology to myself from Imam Din.

' Tell the baby,' I said, ' that the Sahib is not angry, and
take him away.' Imam Din conveyed my forgiveness to
the offender, who had now gathered all his shirt round his
neck, stringwise, and the yell subsided into a sob. The
two set off for the door. 'His name,' said Imam Dm, as
though the name were part of the crime, 'is Muhammad
Dm, and he is a budmash' Freed from present danger,
Muhammad Dm turned round in liis father's arms, and
said gravely, ' It is true that my name is Muhammad Din,
Tahib, but I am not a budmash. I am a man I '

From that day dated my acquaintance with Muham-
mad Din. Never again did he come into my dining-room,

THE STORY OF MUHAMMAD DIN 287

but on the neutral ground of the garden, we greeted each
other with much state, though our conversation was con-
nned to ^Talaam, Tahib' from his side, and 'Salaam^
Muhammad Din^ from mine. Daily on my return from
office, the Httle white shirt and the fat little body used
to rise from the shade of the creeper-covered trellis where
they had been hid; and daily I checked my horse here,
that my salutation might not be slurred over or given un-
seemly.

Muhammad Din never had any companions. He used
to trot about the compound, in and out of the castor-oil
bushes, on mysterious errands of his own. One day I
stumbled upon some of his handiwork far down the
grounds. He had half buried the polo-ball in dust, and
stuck six shrivelled old marigold flowers in a circle round
it. Outside that circle again was a rude square, traced
out in bits of red brick alternating with fragments of
broken china; the whole bounded by a little bank of dust.
The water-man from the well-curb put in a plea for the
small architect, saying that it was only the play of a baby
and did not much disfigure my garden.

Heaven knows that I had no intention of touching the
child's work then or later; but, that evening, a stroll
through the garden brought me unawares full on it; so
that I trampled, before I knew, marigold-heads, dust-
bank, and fragments of broken soap-dish into confusion
past all hope of mending. Next morning, I came upon
Muhammad Din crying softly to himself over the ruin I
had wrought. Some one had cruelly told him that the
Sahib was very angry with him for spoiling the garden,
and had scattered his rubbish, using bad language the
while. Muhammad Din laboured for an hour at effacing

288 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

every trace of the dust-bank and pottery fragments, and
it was with a tearful and apologetic face that he said,
' Talaam, Tahih' when I came home from office. A hasty
inquiry resulted in Imam Din informing Muhammad Din
that, by my singular favour, he was permitted to disport
himself as he pleased. Whereat the child took heart and
fell to tracing the ground-plan of an edifice which was to
eclipse the marigold-polo-ball creation.

For some months, the chubby Httle eccentricity re-
volved in his humble orbit among the castor-oil bushes
and in the dust; always fashioning magnificent palaces
from stale flowers thrown away by the bearer, smooth
water- worn pebbles, bits of broken glass, and feathers
pulled, I fancy, from my fowls — always alone, and
always crooning to himself.

A gaily spotted sea-shell was dropped one day close to
the last of his Httle buildings; and I looked that Muham-
mad Din should build something more than ordinarily
splendid on the strength of it. Nor was I disappointed.
He meditated for the better part of an hour, and his croon-
ing rose to a jubiliant song. Then he began tracing in
the dust. It would certainly be a wondrous palace, this
one, for it was two yards long and a yard broad in groimd-
plan. But the palace was never completed.

Next day there was no Muhammad Din at the head of
the carriage-drive and no ' Talaam^ Tahih ' to welcome my
return. I had grown accustomed to the greeting, and its
omission troubled me. Next day Imam Din told me that
the child was suffering sHghtly from fever and needed
quinine. He got the medicine, and an Enghsh Doctor.

' They have no stamina, these brats,' said the Doctor, as
he left Imam Din's quarters.

THE STORY OF MUHAMMAD DIN 289

A week later, though I would have given much to have
avoided it, I met on the road to the Mussulman burying'
ground Imam Din, accompanied by one other friend,
carrying in his arms, wrapped in a white cloth, all that
<vas left of little Muhammad Din.

ON THE STRENGTH OF A LIKENESS

If your mirror be broken, look into still water; but have a care that you
do not fall in. — Hindu Proverb.

Next to a requited attachment, one of the most con-
venient things that a young man can carry about with
him at the beginning of his career, is an unrequited at-
tachment. It makes him feel important and businesslike,
and blase, and cynical; and whenever he has a touch of
liver, or suffers from want of exercise, he can mourn over
his lost love, and be very happy in a tender, twilight
fashion.

Hannasyde's affair of the heart had been a godsend to
him. It was four years old, and the girl had long since
given up thinking of it. She had married and had many
cares of her own. In the beginning, she had told Hanna-
syde that, 'while she could never be anything more than a
sister to him, she would always take the deepest interest
in his welfare.^ This startlingly new and original remark
gave Hannasyde something to think over for two years;
and his own vanity filled in the other twenty-four months.
Hannasyde was quite different from Phil Garron, but,
none the less, had several points in common with that far
too lucky man.

He kept his unrequited attachment by him as men keep
a well-smoked pipe — for comfort's sake, and because it
had grown dear in the using. It brought him happily

290

ON THE STRENGTH OF A LIKENESS 291

through one Simla season. Hannasyde was not lovely.
There was a crudity in his manners, and a roughness in
the way in which he helped a lady on to her horse, that did
not attract the other sex to him. Even if he had cast
about for their favour, which he did not. He kept his
wounded heart all to himself for a while.

Then trouble came to him. All who go to Simla know
the slope from the Telegraph to the Public Works Office.
Hannasyde was loafing up the hill, one September morn-
ing between caUing hours, when a 'rickshaw came down in
a hurry, and in the 'rickshaw sat the living, breathing im-
age of the girl who had made him so happily unhappy.
Hannasyde leaned against the railings and gasped. He
wanted to run downhill after the 'rickshaw, but that was
impossible; so he went forward with most of his blood in
his temples. It was impossible, for many reasons, that
the woman in the 'rickshaw could be the girl he had
known. She was, he discovered later, the wife of a man
from Dindigul, or Coimbatore, or some out-of-the-way
place, and she had come up to Simla early in the season
for the good of her health. She was going back to
Dindigul, or wherever it was, at the end of the season; and
in all hkehhood would never return to Simla again; her
proper Hill-station being Ootacamund. That night
Hannasyde, raw and savage from the raking up of all old
feelings, took counsel with himself for one measured hour.
What he decided upon was this; and you must decide for
yourself how much genuine affection for the old Love, and
how much a very natural inclination to go abroad and
enjoy himself, affected the decision. Mrs. Landys-Hag-
gert would never in all human likelihood cross his path
again. So whatever he did didn't much matter. She was

292 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

marvellously like the girl who 'took a deep interest^ ana
the rest of the formula. All things considered, it would
be pleasant to make the acquaintance of Mrs. Landys-
Haggert, and for a little time — only a very Kttle time— to
make believe that he was with Alice Chisane again. Every
one is more or less mad on one point. Hannasyde's par-
ticular monomania was his old love, Alice Chisane.

He made it his busmess to get introduced to Mrs.
Haggert, and the introduction prospered. He also made
it his business to see as much as he could of that lady.
When a man is in earnest as to interviews, the facilities
which Simla offers are startling. There are garden-
parties, and tennis-parties, and picnics, and luncheons at
Annandale, and rifle-matches, and dinners and balls;
besides rides and walks, which are matters of private
arrangement. Hannasyde had started with the intention
of seeing a Hkeness, and he ended by doing much more.
He wanted to be deceived, he meant to be deceived, and
he deceived himself very thoroughly. Not only were the
face and figure the face and figure of AUce Chisane, but
the voice and lower tones were exactly the same, and so
were the turns of speech; and the little mannerisms, that
every woman has, of gait and gesticulation, were abso-
lutely and identically the same. The turn of the head
was the same; the tired look in the eyes at the end of a
long walk was the same; the stoop-and-wrench over the
saddle to hold in a pulling horse was the same; and once,
most marvellous of all, Mrs. Landys-Haggert singing to
herself in the next room, while Hannasyde was waiting to
take her for a ride, hummed, note for note, with a throaty
quiver of the voice in the second line, 'Poor Wandering
One!' exactly as Alice Chisane had hummed it for Han-

ON THE STRENGTH OF A LIKENESS 293

nasyde in the dusk of an English drawing-room. In the
actual woman herself — in the soul of her — there was not
the least likeness; she and Alice Chisane being cast in
different moulds. But all that Hannasyde wanted to
know and see and think about, was this maddening and
perplexing likeness of face and voice and manner. He
was bent on making a fool of himself that way; and he
was in no sort disappointed.

Open and obvious devotion from any sort of man is
always pleasant to any sort of woman; but Mrs. Landys-
Haggert, being a woman of the world, could make nothing
of Hannasyde's admiration.

He would take any amount of trouble — he was a selfish
man habitually — to meet and forestall, if possible, her
wishes. Anything she told him to do was law; and he
was, there could be no doubting it, fond of her company so
long as she talked to him, and kept on talking about
trivialities. But when she launched into expression of
her personal views and her wrongs, those small social dif-
ferences that make the spice of Simla Ufe, Hannasyde was
neither pleased nor interested. He didn't want to know
anything about Mrs. Landys-Haggert, or her experiences
in the past — she had travelled nearly all over the world,
and could talk cleverly — he wanted the likeness of Alice
Chisane before his eyes and her voice in his ears. Any-
thing outside that, reminding him of another personality,
jarred, and he showed that it did.

Under the new Post Office, one evening, Mrs. Landys-
Haggert turned on him, and spoke her mind shortly and
without warning. 'Mr. Hannasyde,' said she, ^will you
be good enough to explain why you have appointed your-
self my special cavalier servente ? I don't understand it

C94 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

But I am perfectly certain, somehow or other, that you
don't care the least little bit in the world for me.^ This
seems to support, by the way, the theory that no man
can act or tell lies to a woman without being found
out. Hannasyde was taken off his guard. His defence
never was a strong one, because he was always think-
ing of himself, and he blurted out, before he knew
what he was saying, this inexpedient answer, ^No more
I do.'

The queemess of the situation and the reply, made Mrs.
Landys-Haggert laugh. Then it all came out; and at the
end of Hannasyde's lucid explanation Mrs. Haggert said,
with the least little touch of scorn in her voice, * So I'm to
act as the lay-figure for you to hang the rags of your
tattered affections on, am I? '

Hannasyde didn't see what answer was required, and
he devoted himself generally and vaguely to the praise of
Alice Chisane, which was unsatisfactory. Now it is to be
thoroughly made clear that Mrs. Haggert had not the
shadow of a ghost of an interest in Hannasyde. Only
. . . only no woman likes being made love through

instead of to specially on behalf of a musty divinity of

four years' standing.

Hannasyde did not see that he had made any very par-
ticular exhibition of himself. He was glad to find a sym-
pathetic soul in the arid wastes of Simla.

When the season ended, Hannasyde went down to
his own place and Mrs. Haggert to hers. 'It was like
making love to a ghost,' said Hannasyde to himself, 'and
it doesn't matter; and now I'll get to my work.' But he
found himself thinking steadily of the Haggert-Chisane
ghost; and he could not be certain whether it was Hag-

ON THE STRENGTH OF A LIKENESS 295

gert or Chisane that made up the greater part of the
pretty phantom.

He got understanding a month later.

A peculiar point of this pecuHar country is the way in
which a heartless Government transfers men from one
end of the Empire to the other. You can never be
sure of getting rid of a friend or an enemy till he
or she dies. There was a case once — but that's another
story.

Haggert's Department ordered him up from Dindigul
to the Frontier at two days' notice, and he went through,
losing money at every step, from Dindigul to his station.
He dropped Mrs. Haggert at Lucknow, to stay with some
friends there, to take part in a big ball at the Chutter
Munzil, and to come on when he had made the new
home a little comfortable. Lucknow was Hannasyde's
station, and Mrs. Haggert stayed a week there. Han-
nasyde went to meet her. As the train came in, he dis-
covered what he had been thinking of for the past month.
The unwisdom of his conduct also struck him. The
Lucknow week, with two dances, and an unlimited quan-
tity of rides together, clinched matters; and Hannasyde
found himself pacing this circle of thought: — He adored
Alice Chisane, at least he had adored her. And he ad-
mired Mrs. Landys-Haggert because she was like Alice
Chisane. But Mrs. Landys-Haggert was not in the least
like AHce Chisane, being a thousand times more adorable.
Now Alice Chisane was ' the bride of another,' and so was
Mrs. Landys-Haggert, and a good and honest wife too.
Therefore he» Hannasyde, was . , . here he called

S96 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

himself several hard names, and wished that he had been
wise in the beginning.

Whether Mrs. Landys-Haggert saw what was going on
in his mind, she alone knows. He seemed to take an un-
qualified interest in everything connected with herself, as
distinguished from the Alice-Chisane likeness, and he said
one or two things wliich, if Alice Chisane had been still
betrothed to him, could scarcely have been excused, even
on the grounds of the Hkeness. But Mrs. Haggert turned
the remarks aside, and spent a long time in making
Hannasyde see what a comfort and a pleasure she had
been to him because of her strange resemblance to his old
love. Hannasyde groaned in his saddle and said, 'Yes,
indeed,' and busied himself with preparations for her de-
parture to the Frontier, feeling very small and miserable.

The last day of her stay at Lucknow came, and Han-
nasyde saw her off at the Railway Station. She was very
grateful for his kindness and the trouble he had taken, and
smiled pleasantly and sympathetically as one who knew
the Alice-Chisane reason of that kindness. And Han-
nasyde abused the coolies with the luggage, and hustled
the people on the platform, and prayed that the roof might
fall in and slay him.

As the train went out slowly, Mrs. Landys-Haggert
leaned out of the window to say good-bye — 'On second
thoughts au revoir, Mr. Hannasyde. I go Home in the
Spring, and perhaps I may meet you in Town.'

Hannasyde shook hands, and said very earnestly and
adoringly — 'I hope to Heaven I shall never see your face
again!'

And Mrs. Haggert understood.

WRESSLEY OF THE FOREIGN OFFICE

I closed and drew for my Love's sake,

That now is false to me,
And I slew the Riever of Tarrant Moss,

And set Dumeny free.

And ever they give me praise and gold,

And ever I moan my loss;

For I struck the blow for my false Love's sake,

And not for the men of the Moss!

— Tarrant Moss.

One of the many curses of our life in India is the want of
atmosphere in the painter's sense. There are no half-tints
worth noticing. Men stand out all crude and raw, with
nothing to tone them down, and nothing to scale them
against. They do their work, and grow to think that
there is nothing but their work, and nothing Hke their
work, and that they are the real pivots on which the
Administration turns. Here is an instance of this feeling.
A half-caste clerk was ruling forms in a Pay Office. He
said to me, 'Do you know what would happen if I added
or took away one single line on this sheet? ' Then, with
the air of a conspirator, ' It would disorganise the whole of
the Treasury payments throughout the whole of the
Presidency Circle ! Think of tha t ! '

If men had not this delusion as to the ultra-importance
of their own particular employments, I suppose that they

297

29$ I>LAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

would sit down and kill themselves. But their weakness
is wearisome, particularly when the listener knows that
he himself commits exactly the same sin.

Even the Secretariat believes that it does good when it
asks an over-driven Executive Officer to take a census of
wheat weevils through a district of five thousand square
miles.

There was a man once in the Foreign Office — a man
who had grown middle-aged in the Department, and was
commonly said, by irreverent juniors, to be able to repeat
Atchison's Treaties and Sunnuds backwards in his sleep.
What he did with his stored knowledge only the Secretary
knew; and he, naturally, would not publish the news
abroad. This man's name was Wressley, and it was the
Shibboleth, in those days, to say — 'Wressley knows more
about the Central Indian States than any living man.' If
you did not say this, you were considered one of mean
understanding.

Nowadays, the man who says that he knows the ravel
of the inter-tribal complications across the Border is
of more use; but, in Wressley's time, much attention
was paid to the Central Indian States. They were
called 'foci' and 'factors,' and all manner of imposing
names.

And here the curse of Anglo-Indian Hfe fell heavily.
When Wressley Hfted up his voice, and spoke about such-
and-such a succession to such-and-such a throne, the
Foreign Office were silent, and Heads of Departments re-
peated the last two or three words of Wressley's sentences,
and tacked 'yes, yes,' on to them, and knew that they
were assisting the Empire to grapple with serious political
contingencies. In most big undertakings, one or two

WRESSLEY OF THE FOREIGN OFFICE 299

men do the work while the rest sit near and talk till the
ripe decorations begin to fall.

Wressley was the working member of the Foreign
Office firm, and, to keep him up to his duties when he
showed signs of flagging, he was made much of by his
superiors and told what a fine fellow he was. He did not
require coaxing, because he was of tough build, but what
he received confirmed him in the belief that there was no
one quite so absolutely and imperatively necessary to the
stabiHty of India as Wressley of the Foreign Office.
There might be other good men, but the known, honoured,
and trusted man among men was Wressley of the Foreign
Office. We had a Viceroy in those days who knew
exactly when to ^gentle' a fractious big man, and to
hearten-up a collar-galled Httle one, and so keep all his
team level. He conveyed to Wressley the impression
which I have just set down; and even tough men are apt
to be disorganised by a Viceroy's praise. There was a
case once — but that is another story.

All men knew Wressley's name and office — it was in
Thacker and Spink's Directory — ^but who he was person-
ally, or what he did, or what his special merits were, not
fifty men knew or cared. His work filled all his time, and
he found no leisure to cultivate acquaintances beyond
those of dead Rajput chiefs with Ahir blots in their
scutcheons. Wressley would have made a very good
Clerk in the Herald's College had he not been a Bengal
Civilian.

Upon a day, between office and office, great trouble
came to Wressley — overwhelmed him, knocked him
down, and left him gasping as though he had been a little
schoolboy. Without reason, against prudence, and at a

300 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

moment's notice, he fell in love with a frivolous, golden-
haired girl who used to tear about Simla Mall on a high,
rough Waler, with a blue velvet jockey-cap crammed over
her eyes. Her name was Venner — Tillie Venner — and
she was dehghtful. She took Wressley's heart at a hand-
gallop, and Wressley found that it was not good for man
to live alone; even with half the Foreign Office Records in
his presses.

Then Simla laughed, for Wressley in love was slightly
ridiculous. He did his best to interest the girl in himself
— that is to say, his work — and she, after the manner of
women, did her best to appear interested in what, behind
his back, she called * Mr. W'essley's Wajahs ' ;for she lisped
very prettily. She did not understand one little thing
about them, but she acted as if she did. Men have
married on that sort of error before now.

Providence, however, had care of Wressley. He was
immensely struck with Miss Venner's intelligence. He
would have been more impressed had he heard her private
and confidential accounts of his calls. He held peculiar
notions as to the wooing of girls. He said that the best
work of a man^s career should be laid reverently at their
feet Ruskin writes something like this somewhere, I
think; but in ordinary Hfe a few kisses are better and save
time.

About a month after he had lost his heart to Miss
Venner, and had been doing his work vilely in conse-
quence, the first idea of his Native Rule in Central India
struck Wressley and filled him with joy. It was, as he
sketched it, a great thing — the work of his life — a really
comprehensive survey of a most fascinating subject — to
be written with ail the special and laboriously acquired

WRESSLEY OF THE FOREIGN OFFICE 301

knowledge of Wressley of the Foreign Office — a gift fit for
an Empress.

He told Miss Venner that he was going to take leave,
and hoped, on his return, to bring her a present worthy of
her acceptance. Would she wait? Certainly she would.
Wressley drew seventeen hundred rupees a month. She
would wait a year for that. Her Mamma would help her
to wait.

So Wressley took one year's leave and all the available
documents, about a truck-load, that he could lay hands
on, and went down to Central India with his notion hot in
his head. He began his book in the land he was writ-
ing of. Too much official correspondence had made him
a frigid work man, and he must have guessed that he
needed the white light of local colour on his palette. This
is a dangerous paint for amateurs to play with.

Heavens, how that man worked! He caught his
Rajahs, analysed his Rajahs, and traced them up into
the mists of Time and beyond, with their queens and
their concubines. He dated and cross-dated, pedigreed
and triple-pedigreed, compared, noted, connoted, wove,
strung, sorted, selected, inferred, calendared and counter-
calendared for ten hours a day. And, because this
sudden and new light of Love was upon him, he turned
those dry bones of history and dirty records of misdeeds
into things to weep or to laugh over as he pleased. His
heart and soul were at the end of his pen, and they got
into the ink. He was dowered with sympathy, insight,
humour, and style for two hundred and thirty days and
nights; and his book was a Book. He had liis vast
special knowledge with him, so to speak; but the spirit,
the woven-in human Touch, the poetry and the power of

jos PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

the output, were beyond all special knowledge. But I
doubt whether he knew the gift that was in him then,
and thus he may have lost some happiness. He was toil-
ing for TiUie Venner, not for himself. INIen often do their
best work blind, for some one else's sake.

Also, though this has nothing to do with the story, in
India, where every one knows every one else, you can
watch men being driven, by the women who govern them,
out of the rank-and-file and sent to take up points alone.
A good man, once started, goes forward; but an average
man, so soon as the woman loses interest in his success as
a tribute to her power, comes back to the battalion and is
no more heard of.

Wressley bore the first copy of his book to Simla, and,
blushing and stammering, presented it to Miss Venner.
She read a little of it. I give her review verbatim — 'Oh,
your book? It's all about those howwid Wajahs. I
didn't understand it.'

***** * *

Wressley of the Foreign Office was broken, smashed, — I
am not exaggerating, — by this one frivolous little girl. All
that he could say feebly was—' But— but it's my magnum
opus I The work of my Hfe.' Miss Venner did not know
what magnum opus meant; but she knew that Captain
Kerrington had won three races at the last Gymkhana.
Wressley didn't press her to wait for him any longer. He
had sense enough for that.

Then came the reaction after the year's strain, and
Wressley went back to the Foreign Ofiice and his 'Wa-
jahs,' a compiling, gazetteering, report-writing hack who
wovdd have been dear at three h^idred rupees a month.

WRESSLEY OF THE FOREIGN OFFICE 303

He abided by Miss Vermer^s review. Which proves
that the inspiration in the book was purely temporary and
unconnected with himself. Nevertheless, he had no
right to sink, in a hill-tarn, five packing-cases, brought up
at enormous expense from Bombay, of the best book of
Indian history every written.

When he sold off before retiring, some years later, I was
turning over his shelves, and came across the only existing
copy of Native Rule in Central India — the copy that Miss
Venner could not understand. I read it, sitting on his
mule-trunks, as long as the Hght lasted, and offered him
his own price for it. He looked over my shoulder for a
few pages and said to himself drearily —

'Now, how in the world did I come to write such
damned good stuff as that? '

Then to me —

'Take it and keep it. Write one of your penny-farth-
ing yarns about its birth. Perhaps — perhaps — the whole
business may have been ordained to that end.'

Which, knowing what Wressley of the Foreign Office
was once, struck me as about the bitterest thing that I
had ever heard a man say of his own work.

BY WORD OF MOUTH

Not though you die to-night, O Sweet, and wail,

A spectre at my door,
Shall mortal Fear make Love immortal fail —

I shall but love you more,
Who, from Death's house returning, give me still
One moment's comfort in my matchless ill.

— Shadow Houses.

This tale may be explained by those who know how souls
are made, and where the bounds of the Possible are put
down. I have lived long enough in this India to know
that it is best to know nothing, and can only write the
story as it happened.

Dumoise was our Civil Surgeon at Meridki, and we
called him 'Dormouse,' because he was a round little,
sleepy Httle man. He was a good Doctor and never
quarrelled with any one, not even with our Deputy Com-
missioner who had the manners of a bargee and the tact
of a horse. He married a girl as round and as sleepy-
looking as himself. She was a Miss Hillardyce, daughter
of 'Squash' Hillardyce of the Berars, who married his
Chief's daughter by mistake. But that is another story.

A honeymoon in India is seldom more than a week long ;
but there is nothing to hinder a couple from extending it
over two or three years. India is a delightful country for
married folk who are wrapped up in one another. They
can live absolutely alone and without interruption— just

304

BY WORD OF MOUTH 305

as the Domiice did. Those two little people retired from
the world after their marriage, and were very happy.
They were forced, of course, to give occasional dinners,
but they made no friends thereby, and the Station went
its own way and forgot them; only saying, occasionally,
that Dormouse was the best of good fellows, though dull.
A Civil Surgeon who never quarrels is a rarity, appreci-
ated as such.

Few people can afford to play Robinson Crusoe any-
where— least of all in India, where we are few in the land
and very much dependent on each other's kind offices.
Dumoise was wrong in shutting himself from the world
for a year, and he discovered his mistake when an epi-
demic of typhoid broke out in the Station in the heart
of the cold weather, and his wife went down. He was a
shy little man, and five days were wasted before he
realised that Mrs. Dumoise was burning with something
worse than simple fever, and three days more passed be-
fore he ventured to call on Mrs. Shute, the Engineer's
wife, and timidly speak about his trouble. Nearly every
household in India knows that Doctors are very helpless
in typhoid. The battle must be fought out between
Death and the Nurses minute by minute and degree by
degree. Mrs. Shute almost boxed Dumoise's ears for
what she called his 'criminal delay,' and went off at once
to look after the poor girl. We had seven cases of typhoid
in the Station that winter and, as the average of death is
about one in every five cases, we felt certain that we
should have to lose somebody. But all did their best.
The women sat up nursing the women, and the men
turned to and tended the bachelors who were down, and
we wrestled with those typhoid cases for fifty-six days,

3o6 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

and brought them through the Valley of the Shadow in
triumph. But, just when we thought all was over, and
were going to give a dance to celebrate the victory, little
Mrs. Dumoise got a relapse and died in a week and the
Station went to the funeral. Dumoise broke down ut-
terly at the brink of her grave, and had to be taken away.

After her death, Dumoise crept into his house and re-
fused to be comforted. He did his duties perfectly, but
we all felt that he should go on leave, and the other men
of his own Service told him so. Dumoise was very thank-
ful for the suggestion — he was thankful for anything in
those days — and went to Chini on a walking-tour. Chini
is some twenty marches from Simla, in the heart of the
Hills, and the scenery is good if you are in trouble. You
pass through big, still deodar-forests, and under big, still
cliffs, and over big, still grass-downs swelling like a
woman's breasts; and the wind across the grass and the
rain among the deodars say — 'Hush — hush — hush!' So
little Dumoise was packed off to Chini, to wear down his
grief with a full-plate camera and a rifle. He took also a
useless bearer, because the man had been his wife's
favourite servant. He was idle and a thief, but Dumoise
trusted everything to him.

On his way back from Chini, Dumoise turned aside to
Bagi, through the Forest Reserve which is on the spur of
Mount Huttoo. Some men who have travelled more
than a little say that the march from Kotegarh to Bagi is
one of the finest in creation. It runs through dark wet
forest, and ends suddenly in bleak, nipped hillside and
black rocks. Bagi dak-bungalow is open to all the winds
and is bitterly cold. Few people go to Bagi. Perhaps
that was the reason why Dumoise went there. He halted

BY WORD OF MOUTH 307

at seven in the evening, and his bearer went down the hill-
side to the village to engage cooUes for the next day's
march. The sun had set, and the night-winds were be-
ginning to croon among the rocks. Dumoise leaned on
the railing of the verandah, waiting for his bearer to re-
turn. The man came back almost immediately after he
had disappeared, and at such a rate that Dumoise fancied
he must have crossed a bear. He was running as hard as
he could up the face of the hill.

But there was no bear to account for his terror. He
raced to the verandah and fell down, the blood spurting
from his nose and his face iron-gray. Then he gurgled —
* I have seen the Memsahib ! I have seen the Memsahib I *

' Where? ' said Dumoise.

'Down there, walking on the road to the village. She
was in a blue dress, and she Hfted the veil of her bonnet
and said — '' Ram Dass, give my salaams to the Sahib, and
tell him that I shall meet him next month at Nuddea."
Then I ran away, because I was afraid.'

What Dumoise said or did I do not know. Ram Dass
declares that he said nothing, but walked up and down
the verandah all the cold night, waiting for the Memsahib
to come up the hill, and stretching out his arms into the
dark. But no Memsahib came, and, next day, he went on
to Simla cross-questioning the bearer every hour.

Ram Dass could only say that he had met Mrs. Du-
moise and that she had lifted up her veil and given him
the message which he had faithfully repeated to Dumoise.
To this statement Ram Dass adhered. He did not know
where Nuddea was, had no friends at Nuddea, and most
certainly would never go to Nuddea; not though his pay
were doubled.

3o8 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

Nuddea is in Bengal and has nothing whatever to do
with a Doctor serving in the Punjab. It must be more
than twelve hundred miles south of Meridki.

Dumoise went through Simla without halting, and re-
turned to Meridki, there to take over charge from the
man who had been officiating for him during his tour.
There were some Dispensary accoimts to be explained,
and some recent ordersof the Surgeon- General to be noted,
and, altogether, the taking-over was a full day's work.
In the evening, Dumoise told his locum tenens, who was an
old friend of his bachelor days, what had happened at
Bagi; and the man said that Ram Dass might as well have
chosen Tuticorin while he was about it.

At that moment, a telegraph-peon came in with a
telegram from Simla, ordering Dumoise not to take over
charge at Meridki, but to go at once to Nuddea on special
duty. There was a nasty outbreak of cholera at Nuddea,
and the Bengal Government, being short-handed, as
usual, had borrowed a Surgeon from the Pimjab.

Dumoise threw the telegram across the table and said
— ^Well?'

The other Doctor said nothing. It was all that he
could say.

Then he remembered that Dumoise had passed through
Simla on his way from Bagi; and thus might, possibly
have heard first news of the impending transfer.

He tried to put the question, and the impHed suspicion
into words, but Dumoise stopped him with — 'If I had
desired that, I should never have come back from Chini.
I was shooting there. I wish to live, for I have things to
do . . . but I shall not be sorry.'

The other man bowed his head, and helped, in the

BY WORD OF MOUTH 300'

twilight, to pack up Dumoise's just opened trunks. Rom
Dass entered with the lamps.

'Where is the Sahib going? * he asked.

*To Nuddea/ said Dumoise, softly.

Ram Dass clawed Dumoise's knees and boots and
begged him not to go. Ram Dass wept and howled till
he was turned out of the room. Then he wrapped up all
hi* belongings and came back to ask for a character. He
was not going to Nuddea to see his Sahib die and, perhaps,
to die himself.

So Dumoise gave the man his wages and went down to
Nuddea alone; the other Doctor bidding him good-bye as
one under sentence of death.

Eleven days later he had joined his Memsahib; and the
Bengal Government had to borrow a fresh Doctor to
cope with that epidemic at Nuddea. The first importa-
tion lay dead in Chooadanga dlk-bungalow.

TO BE FILED FOR REFERENCE

By the hoof of the Wild Goat up-tossed
From the Cliff where She lay in the Sun,

Fell the Stone
To the Tarn where the daylight is lost;
So She fell from the light of the Sun,

And alone.

Now the fall was ordained from the first,
With the Goat and the Cliff and the Tarn,

But the Stone
Knows only Her life is accursed,
As She sinks in the depths of the Tam,

And alone.

Oh, Thou who hast builded the world!
Oh, Thou who hast lighted the Sun!
Oh, Thou who hast darkened the Tam!

Judge Thou
The sin of the Stone that was hurled
By the Goat from the light of the Sun,
As She sinks in the mire of the Tarn,

Even now — even now — even now!
— From the Unptiblislted Papers of Mcintosh Jellaludin.

'Say is it dawn, is it dusk in thy Bower,
Thou whom I long for, who longest for me?
Oh, be it night— be it '

Here he fell over a Uttle camel-colt that was sleeping ii*
the Serai where the horse-traders and the best of the

310

TO BE FILED FOR REFERENCE 311

blackguards from Central Asia live; and, because he was
very drunk indeed and the night was dark, he could not
rise again till I helped him. That was the beginning of
my acquaintance with Mcintosh Jellaludin. When a
loafer, and drunk, sings 'The Song of the Bower ' he must
be worth cultivating. He got off the camel's back and
said, rather thickly, ' I — I — I'm a bit screwed, but a dip in
Loggerhead will put me right again; and, I say, have you
spoken to Symonds about the mare's knees? '

Now Loggerhead was six thousand weary miles away
from us, close to Mesopotamia, where you mustn't fish
and poaching is impossible, and Charley Symonds'
stable a half-mile further across the paddocks. It was
strange to hear all the old names, on a May night, among
the horses and camels of the Sultan Caravanserai. Then
the man seemed to remember himself and sober down at
the same time. He leaned against the camel and pointed
to a comer of the Serai where a lamp was burning.

'I live there,' said he, 'and I should be extremely
obliged if you would be good enough to help my mutinous
feet thither; for I am more than usually drunk— most —
most phenomenally tight. But not in respect to my
head. *'My brain cries out against" — how does it go?
But my head rides on the — rolls on the dunghill I should
have said, and controls the qualm.'

I helped him through the gangs of tethered horses and
he collapsed on the edge of the verandah in front of the
line of native quarters.

'Thanks — a thousand thanks! O Moon and little,
little Stars! To think that a man should so shamelessly
. . . Infamous liquor too. Ovid in exile drank no
worse. Better. It was frozen. Alas! I had no ice.

312 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

Good-night. I would introduce you to my wife were 1
sober — or she civilised/

A native woman came out of the darkness of the room,
and began calling the man names; so I went away. He
was the most iateresting loafer that I had had the
pleasure of knowing for a long time; and later on he be-
came a friend of mine. He was a tall, well-built, fair
man, fearfully shaken with drink, and he looked nearer
fifty than the thirty-five which, he said, was his real age.
When a man begins to sink in India, and is not sent Home
by his friends as soon as may be, he falls very low from a
respectable point of view. By the time he changes his
creed, as did Mcintosh, he is past redemption.

In most big cities, natives will tell you of two or three
SahibSy generally low-caste, who have turned Hindu or
Mussulman, and who live more or less as such. But it is
not often that you can get to know them. As Mcintosh
himself used to say, ^If I change my religion for my
stomach's sake, I do not seek to become a martyr to
missionaries, nor am I anxious for notoriety.'

At the outset of acquaintance Mcintosh warned
me. 'Remember this. I am not an object for charity.
I require neither your money, your food, nor your cast-
off raiment. I am that rare animal, a self-supporting
drunkard. If you choose, I will smoke with you, for
the tobacco of the bazars does not, I admit, suit my
palate; and I will borrow any books which you may
not specially value, it is more than likely that I
shall sell them for bottles of excessively filthy country-
liquors. In return, you shall share such hospitality as
my house affords. ..Here is a charpoy on which two
can sit, and it is possible that there may, from time to

J|^

i

TO BE FILED FOR REFERENCE 313

time, be food in that platter. Drink, unfortunately,
you will find on the premises at any hour: and thus
I make you welcome to all my poor establishment/

I was admitted to the Mcintosh household — I and
my good tobacco. But nothing else. Unluckily, one
cannot visit a loafer in the Serai by day. Friends
buying horses would not understand it. Consequently,
I was obliged to see Mcintosh after dark. He laughed
at this, and said simply, * You are perfectly right. When
I enjoyed a position in society, rather higher than
yours, I should have done exactly the same thing.
Good Heavens! I was once^ — he spoke as though he
had fallen from the Command of a Regiment — ^an
Oxford Man!' This accounted for the reference to
Charley Symonds' stable.

*You,* said Mcintosh, slowly, 'have not had that
advantage; but, to outward appearance, you do not
seem possessed of a craving for strong drinks. On the
whole, I fancy that you are the luckier of the two.
Yet I am not certain. You are — forgive my saying so
even while I am smoking your excellent tobacco — pain-
fully ignorant of many things.'

We were sitting together on the edge of his bedstead,
for he owned no chairs, watching the horses being
watered for the night, while the native woman was pre-
paring dinner. I did not like being patronised by a
loafer, but I was his guest for the time being, though
he owned only one very torn alpaca-coat and a pair of
trousers made out of gunny-bags. He took the pipe
out of his mouth, and went on judicially, 'All things
considered, I doubt whether you are the luckier. I do
not refer to your extremely limited classical attain-

314 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

ments, or your excruciating quantities, but to your
gross ignorance of matters more immediately under
your notice. That, for instance,' he pointed to a woman
cleaning a samovar near the well in the centre of the
Serai. She was flicking the water out of the spout in
regular cadenced jerks.

'There are ways and ways of cleaning samovars.
If you knew why she was doing her work in that par-
ticular fashion, you would know what the Spanish
Monk meant when he said —

I the Trinity illustrate,

Drinking watered orange-pulf) —
In three sips the Aryan frustrate,

While he drains his at one gulp —

and many other things which now are hidden from your
eyes. However, Mrs. Mcintosh has prepared dinner.
Let us come and eat after the fashion of the people of
the country — of whom, by the way, you know nothing.'

The native woman dipped her hand in the dish with
us. This was wrong. The wife should always wait until
the husband has eaten. Mcintosh Jellaludin apolo-
gised, saying —

*It is an English prejudice which I have not been
able to overcome; and she loves me. Why, I have
never been able to understand. I foregathered wdth
her at Jullundur, three years ago, and she has remained
with me ever since. I believe her to be moral, and
know her to be skilled in cookery.'

He patted the woman's head as he spoke, and she
cooed softly. She was not pretty to look at.

Mcintosh never told me what position he had held

TO BE FILED FOR REFERENCE 315

before his fall. He was, when sober, a scholar and a
gentleman. When drunk, he was rather more of the
first than the second. He used to get drunk about
once a week for two days. On those occasions the
native woman tended him while he raved in all tongues
except his own. One day, indeed, he began reciting
Atalanta in Calydon, and went through it to the end,
beating time to the swing of the verse with a bedstead-
leg. But he did most of his ravings in Greek or Ger-
man. The man's mind was a perfect rag-bag of useless
things. Once, when he was beginning to get sober, he
told me that I was the only rational being in the Inferno
into which he had descended — a Virgil in the Shades,
he said — and that, in return for my tobacco, he would,
before he died, give me the materials of a new Inferno
that should make me greater than Dante. Then he
fell asleep on a horse-blanket and woke up quite calm.

'Man,' said he, 'when you have reached the utter-
most depths of degradation, Httle incidents which would
vex a higher Kfe are to you of no consequence. Last
night, my soul was among the Gods; but I make no
doubt that my bestial body was writhing down here in
the garbage.'

'You were abominably drunk, if that's what you
mean,' I said.

'I was dnmk — filthily dnmk. I who am the son
of a man with whom you have no concern — I who was
once Fellow of a College whose buttery-hatch you have
not seen. I was loathsomely drunk. But consider
how lightly I am touched. It is nothing to me. Less
than nothing; for I do not even feel the headache which
should be my portion. Now, in a higher life, how ghastly

3i6 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

would have been my punishment, how bitter my repent-
ance! Believe me, my friend with the neglected educa-
tion, the highest is as the lowest — always supposing each
degree extreme.'

He turned round on the blanket, put his head be-
tween his fists, and continued —

'On the Soul which I have lost and on the Conscience
which I have killed, I tell you that I cannot feel ! I am as
the Gods, knowing good and evil, but untouched by
either. Is this enviable or is it not? '

When a man has lost the warning of *next morning's
head,' he must be in a bad state. I answered, looking at
Mcintosh on the blanket, with his hair over his eyes, and
his lips blue-white, that I did not think the insensibility
good enough.

'For pity's sake, don't say that! I tell you, it is good
and most enviable. Think of my consolations ! '

*Have you so many, then, Mcintosh? '

'Certainly; your attempts at sarcasm, which is essen-
tially the weapon of a cultured man, are crude. First,
my attainments, my classical and literary knowledge,
blurred, perhaps, by immoderate drinking — ^which re-
minds me that before my soul went to the Gods last night,
I sold the Pickering Horace you so kindly lent me. Ditta
Mull the clothesman has it. It fetched ten annas, and
may be redeemed for a rupee — ^but still infinitely supe-
rior to yours. Secondly, the abiding alffection of Mrs.
Mcintosh, best of wives. Thirdly, a monument, more
enduring than brass, which I have built up in the seven
years of my degradation.'

He stopped here, and crawled across the room for a
drink of water. He was very shaky and sick.

TO BE FILED FOR REFERENCE 3x7

He referred several times to his 'treasure* — some great
possession that he owned — ^but I held this to be the raving
of drink. He was as poor and as proud as he could be.
His manner was not pleasant, but he knew enough about
the natives, among whom seven years of his life had
been spent, to make his acquaintance worth having. He
used actually to laugh at Strickland as an ignorant man —
* ignorant West and East ' — he said. His boast was, first,
that he was an Oxford man of rare and shining parts,
which may or may not have been true — I did not know
enough to check his statements — and, secondly, that he
'had his hand on the pulse of native life^ — ^which was a
fact. As an Oxford man, he struck me as a prig: he was
always throwing his education about. As a Mohanmie-
dan faquir — as Mcintosh Jellaludin — he was all that I
wanted for my own ends. He smoked several pounds of
my tobacco, and taught me several oimces of things
worth knowing; but he would never accept any gifts, not
even when the cold weather came, and gripped the poor
thin chest under the poor thin alpaca-coat. He grew
very angry, and said that I had insulted him, and that he
was not going into hospital. He had lived like a beast
and he would die rationally, like a man.

As a matter of fact, he died of pneiunonia; and on the
night of his death sent over a grubby note asking me to
come and help him to die.

The native woman was weeping by the side of the bed.
Mcintosh, wrapped in a cotton cloth, was too weak to
resent a fur coat being thrown over him. He was
very active as far as his mind was concerned, and his
eyes were blazing. When he had Abused the Doctor
who came with me, so foully that the indignant old

3i8 PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

fellow left, he cursed me for a few minutes and calmed
down.

Then he told his wife to fetch out 'The Book' from a
hole in the wall. She brought out a big bundle, wrapped
in the tail of a petticoat, of old sheets of miscellaneous
notepaper, all numbered and covered with fine cramped
writing. Mcintosh ploughed his hand through the rub-
bish and stirred it up lovingly.

*This,' he said, 4s my work — the Book of Mcintosh
Jellaludin, showing what he saw and how he lived, and
what befell him and others; being also an account of the
life and sins and death of Mother Maturin. What Mirza
Murad Ali Beg's book is to all other books on native Ufe,
will my work be to Mirza Murad Ali Beg's 1 '

This, as will be conceded by any one who knows Mirza
Murad Ali Beg's book, was a sweeping statement. The
papers did not look specially valuable; but Mcintosh
handled them as if they were currency-notes. Then said
he slowly —

*ln despite the many weaknesses of your education,
you have been good to me. I will speak of your tobacco
when I reach the Gods. I owe you much thanks for many
kindnesses. But I abominate indebtedness. For this
reason, I bequeath to you now the monument more en-
during than brass — my one book — rude and imperfect in
parts, but oh how rare in others! I wonder if you will
understand it. It is a gift more honourable than . . .
Bah! where is my brain rambHng to? You will mutilate
it horribly. You will knock out the gems you call Latin
quotations, you PhiUstine, and you will butcher the style
to carve into your own jerky jargon; but you cannot
destroy the whole of it. * I bequeath it to you. Ethel

TO BE FILED FOR REFERENCE 3^9

. . My brain again! . . . Mrs. Mcintosh, bear wit-
ness that I give the Sahib all these papers. They would
be of no use to you, Heart of my Heart; and I lay it upon
you,' he turned to me here, ' that you do not let my book
die in its present form. It is yours unconditionally— the
story of Mcintosh Jellaludin, which is not the story of
Mcintosh Jellaludin, but of a greater man than he, and of
a far greater wom.an. Listen now! I am neither mad
nor drunk ! That book will make you famous.'

I said ' Thank you,' as the native woman put the bundle
into my arms.

* My only baby ! ' said Mcintosh, with a smile. He was
sinking fast, but he continued to talk as long as breath re-
mained. I waited for the end; knowing that in six cases
out of ten a dying man calls for his mother. He turned on
his side and said —

*Say how it come into your possession. No one will
believe you, but my name, at least, will live. You will
treat it brutally, I know you will. Some of it must go;
the public are fools and prudish fools. I was their serv-
ant once. But do your mangling gently — very gently.
It is a great work, and I have paid for it in seven years'
damnation.'

His voice stopped for ten or twelve breaths, and then he
began mumbling a prayer of some kind in Greek. The
native woman cried very bitterly. Lastly, he rose in bed
and said, as loudly as slowly— 'Not guilty, my Lord!'

Then he fell back, and the stupor held him till he died.
The native woman ran into the Serai among the horses,
and screamed and beat her breasts; for she had loved him.

Perhaps his last sentence in life told what Mclnto^
had once gone through; but, saving the big bundle of old

3flo PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS

sheets in the cloth, there was nothing in his room to s
who or what he had been.

The papers were in a hopeless muddle.

Strickland helped me to sort them, and he said that 1
writer was either an extreme liar or a most wonder
person. He thought the former. One of these days, > ^
may be able to judge for yourselves. The bundle neec '
much expurgation and was full of Greek nonsense, at t
head of the chapters, which has all been cut out.

If the thing is ever published, some one may pcrlu
remember this story, now printed as a safeguard to pre
that Mcintosh Jellaludin and not I myself wrote the Bo
of Mother Maturin.

I don't want the story of the Giant's Robe to come ti
in my case.

TSEXMD

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